New aircraft 'could fly Moscow-New York in under an hour'

Russian aerospace experts say they could be just 10 years from developing an aircraft capable of flying from Moscow to New York in less than an hour.

Dubbed the Cosmoplane, the 250ft long aircraft would fly at a height of 650,000ft and carry up to 1,200 people at speeds of up to 18,000mph.

Plans for the Cosmoplane have been unveiled by experts from the Moscow Aviation Institute, at the International Aviation and Astronautics 2003 exhibition in the Russian capital.

Ivan Obruchev, a member of the team behind the project, said: "Currently, research is being conducted in Russia and the US on an aerospace craft.

"Based on the developments in Russia we will be able to create an aerospace craft in 10-15 years. The twenty-first century is the century of the aerospace craft. They are the future."

MAI researchers say the planes' liquid-propellant rocket engines would run on a mix of liquid hydrogen and oxygen, could be launched vertically and, like normal passenger aircraft today, would be able to be flown both manually and by auto-pilot.

They add the craft would be round in shape, weigh up to 800 tonnes, and G-forces during the flight would be similar to those experienced in an express lift.

Obruchev said: "A Cosmoplane flight from Moscow to New York will take 50 minutes, to Tokyo 53 minutes and to Sydney 66 minutes."

But a trip on the new plane will not be cheap. Initial calculations by the MAI suggest that a ticket would cost at least -£10,000.

Ananova