Feasibility Study of small Satellite Launcher Vehicle launched from atmospheric Carrier Aircraft

The paper deals with the feasibility study of an air-dropped small satellites launcher vehicle. A conceptual design methodology has been defined and then applied to various case-studies, in order to evaluate the main flight, mission and system performances of the unconventional space vehicle (SV) that may be either launched from a supersonic fighter aircraft or from a subsonic cargo aircraft. The SV concept presented is a fast and affordable solution able to access space from any sites of the world in all weather conditions. It is a missile-like solution able to inject in Low Earth Orbits a small payload (mass lower than 200 kilograms) in a few hours, through a low cost mission. At the beginning, the paper presents a short investigation of traditional European space launch capabilities, highlighting the lack of dedicated transport solutions for Nano and Micro-satellite families and proceeding with the analysis of the state of the art of new concepts of unconventional launch solutions. The paper then describes the conceptual design methodology developed, used to accomplish the feasibility study of the SV. This proposed methodology has been translated into a flexible numerical program in Matlab® language, which allows evaluating the main flight and system performances of the SV, after being dropped from its carrier aircraft. The most promising design alternatives, which may be air-dropped either in subsonic or in supersonic flight regimes, are finally described and shown in the paper. Eventually main conclusions are drawn.