title: Avro Vulcan: Britain's Famous Delta-wing V-bomber (Aerofax)
author: Tony Buttler
description: Tony Buttler is a full-time aviation historian with numerous published books and articles.<br><br>Phil Butler contributes to historical aviation magazines Aeromilitaria and The British Roundel. His previous major book was War Prizes: The Album.
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  [Contents](067131985X_toc.htm)
  
  # **CHAPTER SEVEN**
  
  "It says here, 'Marduk has a mean gravity of slightly greater than Earth
  normal, and is a planet of little weather change,' " Sergeant Julian said,
  reading off his pad. He'd managed, along with Poertena, to get two more suits
  up and running before the call came to drop everything and change the loadout
  on the shuttles. Currently, they were unloading.
  
  He was perched on one silver wing of an assault shuttle as his squad moved out
  nonessential materials. The space-to-ground assault craft's variable geometry
  wings could sustain in-air flight at speeds as low as a hundred KPH or as high
  as Mach three, but it also had hydrogen thrusters for space maneuvering.
  Similar to a ground support pinnace, it had lighter weapons and a single top-
  mounted quad-barreled bead cannon, and thus correspondingly more room for
  personnel and equipment.
  
  " '. . . with a median temperature of thirty-thr