Hello All,

The late Dr. Robert L. Forward was a starship-designing physicist who also wrote hard-science fiction novels that depicted spacecraft and other devices that could actually be built. Below is information on the spacecraft described (and illustrated with dimensioned diagrams) in his 1990 novel "Rocheworld," which is available from AbeBooks.com (see: www.abebooks.com ), Alibris.com (see: www.alibris.com ), and Amazon.com (see: www.amazon.com ).

The Surface Lander and Ascent Module (SLAM) is a two-stage (descent stage and ascent stage) cylindrical spacecraft designed to land on planets and satellites in the Barnard's Star system. Strapped to (and partially recessed into) its side is a space plane called the Surface Excursion Module (SEM--more on this vehicle below).

The SEM, which resembles the Lockheed U-2, would make an excellent hinged-wing boost-glider or rocket glider (RC or Free Flight) that would also be a Future/Fiction Scale model! (The outer 2/3 or so of each of the full-scale SEM's wings are folded.) The nuclear turbo-rocket powered craft is designed to fly in planetary atmospheres using the ambient air for propulsion, with the additional capability (using an onboard propellant tank) of flying as a pure rocket vehicle near airless worlds. Its generous wing area would make for a good-flying model version.

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