*WASHINGTON DC: *The world’s largest airplane — a Stratolaunch behemothwith two fuselages and six Boeing 747 engines — made its first test flighton Saturday in California.
The mega jet carried out its maiden voyage over the Mojave desert.
It is designed to carry into space, and drop, a rocket that would in turnignite to deploy satellites.
It is supposed to provide a more flexible way to deploy satellites thanvertical takeoff rockets because this way all you need is a long runway fortakeoff.
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It was built by an engineering company called Scaled Composites.
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The aircraft is so big its wing span is longer than a football field, orabout 1.5 times that of an Airbus A380.
Specifically, the wing span is 117 meters; that of an Airbus A380 is justunder 80.
The plane flew Saturday for about two and a half hours, Stratolaunch said.Until now, it had just carried out tests on the ground. – APP/AFP
