A 28-foot model of the HL-10 lifting-body reentry vehicle is shown being mounted in NASA Langley Research Center's Full Scale Wind Tunnel to determine its low-speed static stability and control characteristics. Although it has no wings, sufficient lift is generated by the body itself to provide some conventional unpowered flight capability similar to that of the X-15. The vehicle will not need recovery devices such as parachutes or paragliders, since it can land like a conventional airplane. The experiment is part of an extensive NASA research program to determine the characteristics of lifting-body reentry vehicles from low-subsonic to hypersonic speeds.
