Scaled Composites White Knight

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White Knight
White Knight with radar attached
White Knight with radar attached
Type: Carrier aircraft
Design country:

United StatesUnited States United States

Manufacturer:

Scaled composites

First flight:

August 1, 2002

Number of pieces:

1

Scaled Composites White Knight (Model 318) is the name of the carrier aircraft that transported the spacecraft SpaceShipOne to an altitude of around 15 kilometers before it was released there. It took off like a normal airplane and carried the space glider up into the air. The aircraft was also used as a carrier for the atmospheric tests of the experimental unmanned aerial vehicle X-37 in 2005 and 2006 .

It was designed and built by Burt Rutan and his company Scaled Composites as part of the Tier One project .

The name White Knight comes from a drawing by an employee of Scaled Composites showing a knight in white armor. The drawing was also used as the aircraft's emblem.

In July 2014, the aircraft was to Paine Field flown in the State of Washington and the Flying Heritage Collection of Paul Allen passed.

Technical specifications

Parameter Data
White Knight White Knight Two
crew 1 pilot (front seat)
2 passengers (back seat)		 ?
Wingspan 28 m 42.67 m
Load capacity 3.6 tons 17 tons
Engines 2 × Turbojet General Electric J85 -GE-5 4 × turbofan Pratt & Whitney PW308
Mission duration 90 minutes 90 minutes
costs $ 20 to 30 million ?
Service ceiling over 16,000 m 18,300 m
Mark N318SL N348MS

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Mothership adopts a new space plane. May 27, 2005, accessed December 31, 2018 .
  2. ^ Dan Linehan: SpaceShipOne: An Illustrated History . Zenith Press, 2008, ISBN 978-0-7603-3188-0 , pp. 21 (English).
  3. ↑ SpaceShipOne's White Knight Airplane Makes Final Flight. Accessed December 31, 2018 .

Web links

Commons : White Knight  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files