Can't help feeling the need to comment about the recent airline crisis, especially in Britain, what if HOTOL or another space-plane had been developed, they had the technology at their fingertips and it went no where? The ash-cloud does not reach the heights that these planes (omitting the word aero) would have been travelling although they would have to fly through to get there, low flying should not be excluded as a means and maybe old retro technology could help us here, bring out the old prop airliners or even make some new ones, what an adventure for people travelling long distance to have to stop every one thousand miles to refuel somewhere. A better view of the earth and some fun weather to fly through, but I'm just an old romantic.:-)

HOTOL never reached anything near commercial viability, orders of magnitude more expensive than Concorde passenger mile. Besides the optional designs offer no advantage in volcanic activity.

Even if technically successful, I wouldn't opt to fly as passenger in an unmanned space rocket glider into New York, Los Angeles, Heathrow or Frankfurt.

I don't see an aviation authority approving airworthiness to unmanned passenger craft, in the forseeable future. First we need to get the existing, highly automated passenger aircraft, to operate in an acceptable level of safety.

Ted Turner said yesterday that getting alternate clean energy sources in view of the Gulf of Mexico leak, is more important than putting men on the moon.

HOTOL never reached anything near commercial viability, orders of magnitude more expensive than Concorde passenger mile. Besides the optional designs offer no advantage in volcanic activity.

Even if technically successful, I wouldn't opt to fly as passenger in an unmanned space rocket glider into New York, Los Angeles, Heathrow or Frankfurt.

I don't see an aviation authority approving airworthiness to unmanned passenger craft, in the forseeable future. First we need to get the existing, highly automated passenger aircraft, to operate in an acceptable level of safety.

Ted Turner said yesterday that getting alternate clean energy sources in view of the Gulf of Mexico leak, is more important than putting men on the moon.

Our Energy resources are finite! the universe in infinite, lets get out there and use it, to our advantage!