REPORT OKS X-33 TESTS AT EDWARDS.

Byline: Charles F. Bostwick Daily News Staff Writer

A NASA environmental study released Friday found no roadblocks to launching the 11,000-mph X-33 spacecraft prototype out of Edwards Air Force Base.

The Lockheed Martin ``Skunk Works'' craft's sonic booms will be comparable to the space shuttles'; building the launch site will require finding and moving 15 or 20 desert tortoises; and crash and explosion risks on the flights across the western United States are well within test-aircraft standards, the draft environmental impact statement said.

``We don't see any any environmental showstoppers for any of the trajectories from Edwards,'' said Rebecca McCaleb, director of the environmental engineering and management office at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama, where the X-33 program is directed. ``We have areas we need to take care of, but all of them are manageable.''

Meetings to take comments on the 600-page environmental impact statement and whether it adequately examined all the X-33's possible effects are scheduled in Lancaster and Boron, as well as in nine other communities as far away as Helena, Mont.

The public comment period ends Aug. 17, and NASA headquarters is expected to make a decision on the launch site and other issues this fall.

Precursor to a new spaceship intended to reduce dramatically the cost for putting cargo into space, the X-33 is scheduled to make its first brief flight in March 1999, followed over the next nine months by up to 14 successively longer ones that culminate with a flight to Montana.

The wingless, unmanned, wedge-shaped craft is expected to take off like a rocket from Edwards Air Force Base and fly at 11,000 mph across the western United States - reaching Montana in less than 26 minutes.

A launch site has not been picked, but the favored site is near Haystack Butte, a remote area in the eastern portion of Edwards. The butte is about three miles north of the Kern County line - the southern base border - and six miles west of Highway 395.

Lockheed Martin officials say the launch complex will be fairly simple and will allow the X-33 to be fueled and serviced in a horizontal position, then pointed skyward for launch.

Like the space shuttle, the X-33 will be launched vertically and land like an airplane. Unlike the shuttle, however, the X-33 will not shed any parts, such as booster rockets, during flight. After each flight, the X-33 would be ferried back by a modified Boeing 747.

Aerospace engineers call the approach a ``single-stage-to-orbit, reusable launch vehicle.''

About 650 people are at work in Palmdale on the craft, which Lockheed Martin is developing under a $941 million contract with the government. The company is expected to invest $212 million of its own money in the program.

The X-33 itself will go just to the edge of space, not into orbit, but it is intended to lead to the production of a spacecraft that will lower the cost of putting satellites and other payloads into space from $10,000 a pound to $1,000 a pound or less.

At this point, NASA officials expect the space shuttle will continue to carry people into space, while the X-33's successor - named VentureStar and about twice as large - would carry cargo. Neither the X-33 nor the VentureStar is intended to carry a pilot; instead, they would be controlled by computers.

The X-33's first flight in March 1999 is expected to last about nine minutes, ending 100 miles away at Silurian Dry Lake, north of Baker. Landings there will require shutting down for up to four hours Highway 127, the southern route into Death Valley National Park, the environmental report says.

During that first flight, it is hoped the X-33 will reach a top speed of about three times the speed of sound - about 2,200 mph, or the same as an SR-71 Blackbird spy plane.

Other longer, faster flights over the succeeding nine months are planned to go to Michael Army Air Field at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah and to Malstrom Air Force Base in Montana, 950 miles from Edwards.

Flight tests will involve speeds of up to Mach 15 - about 11,000 mph - and altitudes of 250,000 feet, or close to the edge of space.

NASA officials said the study examined potential effects including noise and sonic booms, flight safety, and effects on airspace and traffic patterns.

The launch would produce noise noticeable as far away as 6.2 miles and lasting up to 20 seconds, the report said. The report concluded the maximum noise levels outside the base boundaries would have minimal impact.

Sonic booms would be similar to the those created by the space shuttles as they descend toward landing at Edwards, the report said.

``Most of the area under the flight track would experience low-level sonic booms . . . with small probability of damage to structures, usually a cracked window,'' the report said.

A small area over the desert about 15 miles north or east of Edwards' borders would experience a stronger boom, but still less than that of the SR-71 spy plane, the report said.

``Sonic booms that would be produced by X-33 are considered to be mildly annoying, but not dangerous for humans,'' the report said.

The study says the Haystack Buttes area under consideration for the launch site is inhabited by desert tortoises, which are a federally protected species, but relatively few live there. The area already undergoes disturbance by humans and contains bombs dropped there in Air Force tests, the report said.

``The loss of a maximum of 47 acres of habitat that supports so few tortoises is not likely to be greatly influence desert tortoise populations or increase the species' extinction risk,'' the report said.

Public meetings

NASA will hold two public meetings in the Antelope Valley to present the findings of a study on the potential environmental impacts of developing and testing the X-33 spacecraft prototype.

The Lancaster meeting is 7 p.m. July 21 at Lancaster High School, 44701 32nd St. W. The Boron meeting is 7 p.m. July 22 at Boron High School, 26831 Prospect St.

The full text of the 600-page environmental impact statement will appear on NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center environmental office Web site at http://eemo.msfc.nasa.gov/eemo/X33eis.

Written comments can be mailed to Dr. Rebecca C. McCaleb, Director of the Environmental Engineering and Management Office, Code AE01, Marshall Space Flight Center, AL 35812; faxed to [phone]; or e-mailed to x33eismsfc.nasa.gov.

CAPTION(S):

Photo, box

PHOTO (color in AV only) This computer image shows the design of the reusable space launch vehicle, of which the X-33 is the prototype. NASA is planning on testing the supersonic X-33 at Edward Air Force Base.

BOX: (AV only) Public meetings (see text)