Showing posts with label slingatron. Show all posts
Showing posts with label slingatron. Show all posts

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

Slingatron shoots stuff into space on the cheap

From the Sci Fi Tech blog:

The problem with putting stuff in space is that it's just so damn expensive; otherwise everybody would be doing it (apart from just governments and eccentric billionaires). Sending a mere pound of material into space these days costs over $10,000 using conventional rockets. Thinking unconventionally, Derek Tidman, president of Advanced Launch Corporation, came up with the Slingatron: a launcher that shoots projectiles into space by spinning them faster and faster until they reach escape velocity and then firing them up into the final frontier.