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The Ultimate Glide: PlanetSpace's Suborbital Travel Plan Tariq Malik Staff Writer SPACE.com Wed Feb 14, 11:30 AM ET Even as the private spaceflight firm PlanetSpace, Inc. aims for orbital space shots, the Chicago-based company is also drawing up plans for a suborbital Earth transit system. The firm's planned Silver Dart space plane, currently targeted at providing NASA crew and cargo services to the International Space Station (ISS), could be equipped with a suborbital rocket engine for point-to-point flights around Earth, PlanetSpace CEO Geoff Sheerin told SPACE.com [image]. "This is the killer application for space industry," Sheerin said. "You've got a...

A Saint Louis University professor and a contender for the X Prize plan to unveil Thursday their plans for a space vehicle that would take passengers into orbit to the International Space Station. Paul Czysz, professor emeritus of aerospace engineering, is teaming up with Ontario-based PlanetSpace and Canadian Arrow, a competitor for the X Prize, to develop the orbital vehicle, called the Silver Dart. The vehicle is based on a hypersonic glider Czysz helped test in the early 1960s.