Прототип возвращаемого аппарата IXV Европейского космического агентства

Re entry vehicle prototype by ESA for the development of the Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle

The Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV) is a European Space Agency (ESA) experimental suborbital re entry vehicle. It was developed to serve as a prototype lifting body orbital return vehicle to validate the ESA's work in the field of reusable orbital return vehicles. The European Space Agency has a program called Future Launchers Preparatory Programme (FLPP), which made a call for submissions for a reusable spaceplane. One of the submissions was by the Italian Space Agency, that presented their own Programme for Reusable In orbit Demonstrator in Europe (PRIDE program) which went ahead to develop an initial test vehicle, Pre X, followed the prototype named Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV) and the consequential Space Rider that inherits technology from its prototype IXV. On 11 February 2015, the IXV conducted its first 100 minute suborbital space flight, successfully completing its mission upon landing intact on the surface of the Pacific Ocean. The vehicle is the first ever lifting body to perform full atmospheric reentry from orbital speed. Past missions have flight tested either winged bodies, which are highly controllable but also very complex and costly, or capsules, which are difficult to control but offer less complexity and lower cost.

During the 1980s and 1990s, there was significant international interest in the development of reusable launch platforms and reusable spacecraft, particularly in respect to spaceplanes, perhaps the most high profile examples of these being the American Space Shuttle and Soviet Buran programmes. The national space agencies of European nations, such as France's Centre National d'Études Spatiales (CNES) and Germany's German Aerospace Center (DLR), worked on their own designs during this era, the most prominent of these to emerge being the Hermes spaceplane. Development of the Hermes programme, which was backed by the European Space Agency (ESA) for several years, was ultimately terminated in 1992 prior to any flights being performed in favour of a partnership arrangement with the Russian Aviation and Space Agency (RKA) to use the existing Soyuz spacecraft instead. While work on the development of the Hermes vehicle was cancelled during the early 1990s, the ESA maintained its strategic long term objective to indigenously develop and eventually deploy similar reusable space vehicles. Accordingly, in support of this goal, the ESA embarked upon a series of design studies on different experimental vehicle concepts as well as to refine and improve technologies deemed critical to future reentry vehicles. In order to test and further develop the technologies and concepts produced by these studies, there were clear needs to accumulate practical flight experience with reentry systems, as well as to maintain and expand upon international cooperation in the fields of space transportation, exploration, and science. Out of these desires emerged the Future Launchers Preparatory Programme (FLPP), an ESA headed initiative conceived and championed by a number of its member states, which provided a framework for addressing the challenges and development of the technology associated with reentry vehicles. In 2011, the total estimated cost for the IXV project was reportedly
During late 2012, the IXV's subsonic parachute system was tested at the Yuma Proving Ground in Arizona, United States. Shortly thereafter, a series of water impact tests were conducted at Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche's INSEAN research tank near Rome, Italy. On 21 June 2013, an IXV test vehicle was dropped from an altitude of in the Salto di Quirra range off Sardinia, Italy. The purpose of this test drop was to validate the vehicle's water landing system, including the subsonic parachute, flotation balloons, and beacon deployment. A small anomaly was encountered during the inflation of the balloons; however, all of the other systems performed as expected. Following the drop test, the vehicle was retrieved for further analysis. On 23 June 2014, the recovery ship Nos Aries conducted a training exercise involving a single IXV test article off the coast of Tuscany. During June 2014, the IXV test vehicle arrived at the ESTEC Technical Centre in Noordwijk, The Netherlands, to undergo a test campaign to confirm its flight readiness in anticipation of a flight on a Vega rocket, which was by that point scheduled to occur during November of that year.

The Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV) is a prototype uncrewed reusable spaceplane —and the precursor of the next model called Space Rider. According to the ESA, the Intermediate part of its name is due to the shape of the vehicle not necessarily being representative of the envisioned follow on production spacecraft. As an experimental vehicle primarily intended to gather data, various assorted sensors and monitoring equipment were present and operational throughout the full length of the flight in order to gather data to support the evaluation effort, including the verification of the vehicle's critical reentry technologies. The IXV is the precursor of the next model named Space Rider, also developed under the Italian PRIDE programme for ESA. however, the vehicle was later rescheduled to perform its first launch using the newly developed Vega launcher during late 2014. This initial launch window was ultimately missed due to unresolved range safety concerns. Following some delays, on 11 February 2015 the IXV was successfully launched into a suborbital trajectory by a Vega rocket on the VV04 mission. the vehicle separated from the Vega launch vehicle at 333 km altitude and ascended to 412 km, after which it commenced a controlled descent towards beginning its reentry at 120 km altitude, travelling at a recorded speed of 7.5 km/s, identical to a typical re entry path to be flown by low Earth orbit (LEO) spacecraft. Following re entry, the IXV glided over the Pacific Ocean prior to the opening of its landing parachutes, which were deployed in order to slow down the craft's descent, having flown over 7300 km from the beginning of its reentry. Jean Jacques Dordain, then director general of the ESA, stated of the mission: "It couldn't have been better, but the mission itself is not yet over it will move the frontiers of knowledge further back concerning aerodynamics, thermal issues, and guidance and navigation of such a vehicle – this lifting body".

In the ESA December 2016 Science Budget funding was approved by the Ministerial Council for the next IXV flight in the form of the commercialised Space Rider orbital vehicle. Following design reviews in 2018 and 2019, a full size mockup was to be dropped from a balloon in 2019 and will have a first flight atop a Vega C in 2020/2021. It will then conduct approximately 5 science flights at 6 to 12 month intervals before becoming commercially available from 2025 at a cost of $40,000 per kg of payload for launch, operation, and return to Earth. The Space Rider mini shuttle will have a length of between 4 and 5 meters, a payload capacity of 800 kg, a total mass of 2,400 kg, and endurance of 2 to 6 month missions at a 400 km orbit before returning to Earth and being reflown within 4 months. The Vega C rocket's 4th stage payload dispenser AVUM acts as the service module for the shuttle, providing orbital manoeuvring and braking, power, and communications before being jettisoned for re entry. The AVUM service module replaces the integrated IXV Propulsion Module and frees 0.8 m3 of internal space in the vehicle for a payload bay. The Space Rider is similar in operation to the US X 37B but half the X37's length and a fifth the X37's mass and payload capacity, which will make it the smallest and lightest spaceplane to ever fly. Payload doors will be opened on achieving orbit exposing instruments and experiments to space before being closed for landing. In December 2020, ESA signed contracts with co prime contractors Thales Alenia Space and Avio for delivery of the Space Rider flight model. The first flight is now scheduled in late 2025.