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Above
General layout of the Pélican Slew Wing Interface Vehicle. Courtesy of
Mechernene et Baali.
Narrative
The troops glanced
nervously around themselves as they shuffled past the growing pile of
gear on the taxi-way, discarding equipment that only a few hours before
they had been relying on to keep them alive. A distant crump caused them
to flinch in unison but they were distracted by the growing roar of the
incoming space plane.
The Dassault Pélican
thundered overhead, surprisingly slowly for a space plane, with its wing
fully rotated and its landing gear down. It thumped down on to the runway,
slowed and taxied towards the front of the line of troops awaiting evacuation.
Once it came to
a halt the Pélican's nose dipped down, the lower half of its nose split
apart and the loading ramp began to descend. The exhausted men began to
move forward as the MSIF load master waved them forward into the belly
of the space plane. From my vantage point a little way away it looked
as though a dragon had descended from the sky and was devouring a group
of docile humans. The load master's shouts distracted me from my daydreaming.
A group of men had retained their personal equipment and their NCO was
arguing with the load master.
I sidled over
in an attempt to overhear without attracting the attention of the nervous,
angry and well armed group.
"We've got no
orders to abandon our gear!" protested the corporal.
"That's
fine with me." the load master replied. "Just go and tell the five people
at the back of the line we can't take them with us because you want to
take your rifle and rucksack home with you. Now stop being so freeking
stupid, dump the crap and get on board."
As I filed on
board five minutes later, at the back of the line, I passed a small pile
of military equipment which disappeared from view as the Pélican's ramp
withdrew and the nose closed around us. Never in my life had I been so
glad to hear the sound of a door closing.
Excerpt
from "The Fall of Kimanjano" by J.C. Dunleavy, Tirania Press, 2301.
Development
Slew wing spaceplanes
first became a practical proposition with the advent of adaptive wing
morphology (AWM) in the early 2200s. AWM allows the shape of a wing to
be altered by twisting and stretching the wing rather than by adding mechanical
devices, such as flaps, to alter the shape (and hence the flight characteristics)
of a fixed geometry wing.
A slew wing consists
of a single wing that pivots horizontally around a central point fixed
to the aircraft body. This gives the aircraft a variable wing geometry
that greatly improves its flight characteristics in different flight regimes.
Variable geometry wings are nothing new and the swing wing aircraft dates
back over 300 years to before the Twilight War.
In 2223 the Dassault
Design Bureau began the development of a variable geometry wing interface
vehicle intended for both cargo and passenger duties. The variable geometry
wing has significant advantages over the standard delta wing design for
a space plane. A delta wing design has very high landing and take off
speeds as its wing is designed to be most efficient in supersonic and
hypersonic flight. A variable geometry wing (swing wing or slew wing)
however gives much better subsonic performance thereby greatly reducing
landing and take off speeds and consequently significantly reducing the
length of runway required.
Dassault considered
both swing and slew wings for their design and finally settled on the
slew wing. The slew wing is mechanically much simpler than the swing wing
(once AWM can be utilised) making it both cheaper and more reliable. Additionally
the slew wing can be stored along the length of the fuselage (without
the need to include folding wing designs which add complexity and weak
points to the design) thus significantly reducing the hanger requirements
for the the vehicle and improving access to docking ports.
Propulsion for the
vehicle was provided by a hybrid jet and rocket system. During atmospheric
flight (subsonic/supersonic/hypersonic) four air breathing jet engines
were utilised. A variable geometry air intake system, utilising the same
adaptive morphology technology used in the wings, allowed the engines
to operate over the very wide range of airspeeds. In addition thrust reversers
were fitted to further decrease the required landing distance. A hydrogen
and oxygen fuelled aerospike rocket system was also provided for out of
atmosphere operations and to provide the final boost to orbit.
In common with other
interface vehicles of the time the Pélican was designed with a variety
of command options. The standard version was unmanned and intended for
operation in the well controlled and regulated interface environments
of Earth and Tirane. Piloted and remotely piloted versions were also available
(at the expense of cargo capacity). The piloted version had no conventional
cockpit with direct visibility instead a pressurised pilot cabin at the
rear of the cargo bay was provided with all visual inputs provided by
cameras. In effect the piloted version of the Pélican was identical to
the remotely piloted version with the remote control station fitted in
the cargo bay and hard wired into the controls rather than communicating
via radio.
The first prototype
(which had no aerospike rocket) flew in 2229 and the first flight to orbit
was achieved in 2231. In 2233 the Pélican was finally certified for operation
by the Direction de Surveillance des Véhicules Aérospatiaux (DSVA : Aerospace
Vehicle Supervisory Department of the French Transport Ministry) under
either manual or automatic control.
The Pélican was originally
designed and marketed as a civilian interface transport and its relatively
short take off and landing abilities made it a popular choice for operations
from regional airports. Those same abilities also made the Pélican attractive
to military and colonial authorities and in 2235 a combined French Colonial
and Defence Ministry contract was given to Mechernene et Baali to produce
a modified version of the Pélican.
The Pélican C40 was
designed to be much more robust and have improved maintainability for
service in the colonies. A nose door option to allow the transport of
large cargoes was also included. The C40 was purchased in considerable
numbers as the standard interface vehicle for the French colonial programme.
Over the sixty years
since the Pélican first flew a bewildering range of upgrades, enhancements,
modifications, engine options and adaptions have been produced however
the basic form of the space plane remains unchanged.
Configuration
Basic Layout
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