aircraft designed for near earth orbital flight by the US Airforce Flight Dynamics Laboratory, the Silver Dart was a lifting body concept designed to glide from hypersonic speeds of Mach 22 down to landing. The goal was to develop an orbital space craft/hypersonic glider capable of carrying around eight passengers. The spacecraft was expected to launch vertically atop a two-stage-plus-boosters rocket, propelled at takeoff by 28 Canadian Arrow rocket engines (slightly updated replicas of the German V-2 engine) and land horizontally on an aircraft runway, in an arrangement reminiscent of the Dynasoar project by NASA. NASA based its Martin Marietta X-24B test aircraft on the FDL-7 lifting body, and valued the added range and stability of the sleek, sharp-nosed design. FDL-7's lifting body design was projected to be able to give the Silver Dart about twice the lift coefficient of NASA's space shuttles at subsonic speeds. The design was expected to have a higher glide and cross range than the Shuttle Orbiter, since it was designed with a 4,000 mile cross range. The ship was intended to use a metal skin that would be more resistant to weather conditions than the Space Shuttle. PlanetSpace planned for an initial demonstration flight in 2009. Athena III In early 2008 PlanetSpace proposed the Athena III launch vehicle, a 2.8-million-pound-thrust ISS resupply rocket, to NASA under the rebid of the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program. The Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Booster (SRB) derived rocket was to feature 2 1/2 segments from the SRB, and was to be realized in a joint venture with Lockheed Martin and Alliant Techsystems (ATK). The PlanetSpace proposal was not accepted for NASA funding. On February 19, 2008, the second round award was made to Orbital Sciences Corporation, for the Cygnus spacecraft. NASA's selection statement showed that Orbital beat PlanetSpace on funding concerns. In October 2008, PlanetSpace, Lockheed Martin and ATK teamed up with Boeing and the State of Florida to obtain private financing for the project outside the NASA funding they did not obtain. Dissolved for non-compliance PlanetSpace had its incorporated status revoked by the Canadian government for non-compliance under section 212 of the Canadian Business Corporations Act on 6 February 2013. The government's documents showed that PlanetSpace's last annual meeting occurred in 2010, and that was also the last time the corporation reported its annual filings. References Defunct technology companies of Canada Defunct spaceflight companies Defunct companies