Fired up: rocket engine designed for reusable flights tested

STENNIS SPACE CENTER, Miss. – Triggering a huge cloud of steam and a roar, officials on Monday launched a rocket engine designed to be part of a reusable spaceship that can launch into space Many times. 19659002] The AR-22 engine will power an experimental spacecraft – called the Phantom Express – which is a collaboration between the Advanced Defense Research Projects Agency, Boeing and Aerojet Rocketdyne. Engineers are currently testing the engine over a 10-day period by heating it for 100 seconds and then doing it again 24 hours later. On Monday, Tom Martin, of Rocketdyne's Aerojet, said Monday's test at the Stennis Space Center, in Mississippi, was "awesome" but a bit "boring" because everything went wrong. unfolded as planned.

"The action starts when the engine stops, the idea is how to prepare this engine within 24 hours," he said. "The engine did exactly what we expected."

The goal is to create a new type of spacecraft that can launch into low Earth orbit on short notice – – days instead of months or years – and cost less than programs traditional space.

The spacecraft would be unmanned and about the size of a business jet. It would take off vertically and once it reaches a certain altitude, a second leg would be released that could then deploy a satellite into orbit.

The first leg would slide to land and land horizontally on a runway like an airplane. He would then be able to quickly launch again for another flight. Steve Johnston, of Boeing, said launching satellites into space was a costly and time-consuming undertaking, said Scott Wierzbanowski, DARPA

. "What we wanted to do to DARPA was to change that paradigm: we wanted to allow the tactical use of space, to be able to make it more affordable, to reduce time in space," said Wierzbanowski. "We want to show that you can have a reusable space system and use it daily."

One of the main challenges is to dry the moisture in the engine that is created when the fuel – liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen – – burns, said Jeff Haynes , from Aerojet. Once the engine has been ignited, it circulates high pressure air through the system for hours to dry.

"It generates a lot of moisture and water in the engine". With the Space Shuttle Program, this moisture was also a problem, but drying would only take weeks or months. "We have to show that we can do it in about eight hours, maybe six hours."

Wierzbanowski stated that the Phantom Express actually uses many of the Space Shuttle's capabilities and technologies – particularly the main engine and the thermal protection system.