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"I have been a soreheaded occupant of a file drawer labeled 'Science Fiction' and I would like out, particularly since so many serious critics regularly mistake the drawer for a urinal."
- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
 |
| Winged Rocket Shuttle | ||
| A sort of plane that briefly reached space while traveling between points on a planet. |
Ever need to get there in a hurry? This is the way to fly.
| When he weighed in [at Albuquerque] he ran into another new security wrinkle. "Got a camera in that stuff, son? the weightmaster had inquired as he passed over his bags.
"No. Why?" "Because we'll fog your film when we fluoroscope, that's why." Apparently X-ray failed to show any bombs hidden in his underwear; his bags were handed back and he went aboard - the winged-rocket Santa Fe Trail, shuttling between the Southwest and New Chicago. Inside, he fastened his safety belts, snuggled down into the cushions, and waited. At first the noise of the blast-off bothered him more than the pressure. But the noise dopplered away as they passed the speed of sound while the acceleration grew worse; he blacked out. He came to as the ship went into free flight, arching in a high parabola over the plains... [He] listened half-heartedly to the canned description coming out of the loudspeaker of the country over which they were falling. Presently, near Kansas City, the sky turned from black to purple again, the air foils took hold, and the passengers again felt weight as the rocket continued glider fashion on a long, screaming approach to New Chicago. |
| Technovelgy from Between Planets,
by Robert Heinlein. Published by Charles Scribner's Sons in 1951 Additional resources -
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Tech news articles related to Between Planets
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Winged Rocket Shuttle-related
news articles:
- Rocketplane For Hawaiian Spaceport?
- SpaceX BFR Lands $41M From USAF
- SpaceX Rocket Quick Reaction Force
- SpaceX Rocket Shuttle Point-To-Point On Earth
| Europa Clipper Plate Carries A Special Message |
| China Wants To Build Mega Space Ships |
| Dream Of Building Your Own Rocket? |
| Used Dragon Cargo Spacecraft Will Fly Again |
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'... completely forgetting the ship at sight of the awesome figure and great head of the giant Gaut...'
'So, Ender, we will now begin your education.'
'What strange sensitivity! What an amazing development of science was manifested in every move and act and word of this Robot!'
'Forget the head atop it, the legs below, feet, arms, hands. It compels erasure.'
'That explains how it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair or to perch on a flagpole in imitation of a giant bird, even in the windy city of Chicago.'
'The thirty-odd miles of The Factory’s circumference...'
'Wandering mines, you took them out on the edge of the desert, set them down and activated them.'
'Once in the very first weeks of the war, before everyone had been evacuated from the surface...'
