The world’s largest aircraft, The Stratolaunch, boasting 6 engines, 2 fuselages and a wingspan twice as long as the Boeing 747, is growing ever closer to its first flight. In development since 2011, the Stratolaunch recently completed its first high-speed taxi test in the California Mojave Desert.
The enormous aircraft weighs in at 580 tons and carries 6 Pratt & Whitney Engines on 28 wheels. The brainchild of Microsoft Co-Founder Paul Allen, The Stratolaunch, will be used as a launch vehicle for space rockets. Once operational, it will carry rockets up to the cruising altitude of 36,000 feet before they’re blasted off into space.
Referred to by some as “385 feet of crazy” for it’s enormous wingspan, the aircraft will launch satellites into space with the support of 4 different satellite-toting vehicles, the company revealed on Aug. 20th. All of the satellites will blast their way into orbit after being dropped at altitude from a mother-ship plane.