{"id":25954,"date":"2021-11-08T09:45:24","date_gmt":"2021-11-08T09:45:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.skyatnightmagazine.com\/?p=101766"},"modified":"2021-11-08T09:58:12","modified_gmt":"2021-11-08T09:58:12","slug":"7-spaceflight-inventions-that-never-took-off","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/rss_feed\/7-spaceflight-inventions-that-never-took-off\/","title":{"rendered":"7 spaceflight inventions that never took off"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Jon Powell\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Monday, 08 November 2021 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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They say that \u2018necessity is the mother of invention\u2019. Indeed,\u00a0there have been many great ideas spawned in eureka moments.<\/p>\n

However, aside from Back to the Future<\/i>\u2019s <\/i>ingenious flux capacitor, there have and will continue to be some clever concepts that never saw their true potential, and the filing cabinet on space-orientated ideas is bulging at the seams.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s take the \u2018space elevator<\/strong>\u2019 (pun intended). This idea was first explored by Arthur C Clarke <\/span>in his 1979 novel The Fountains of Paradise<\/i>, where he envisaged a mammoth tower reaching into space.<\/p>\n

More strange space stories:<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n