Stock photography, photos: European Hermes Space Shuttle Stock photos of The Hermes space shuttle began as a purely French project. As development costs increased, France managed to obtain other European funding, primarily from Germany, for development of the spacecraft. Hermes would have provided independent European manned access to space, and the weight growth of the spacecraft during design and development was a major driver in the specification for the Ariane 5 space launcher. Hermes was designed to take three astronauts to orbits of up to 800 km altitude on missions of 30 to 90 days in space. Payload to be returned to earth could be contained in a small payload bay, but most experiments were included in an expendable pressurized supply module, equipped with a docking port, mounted to the base of the glider. Paris Air Show ˆ France. Photograph: © Robert Burch Click for a larger image and more information Keywords associated with this stock photo: hermes space shuttle, paris air show, European space agency, aerospace, aero, space, aviation, space shuttle, rocket, ariane, ariane rocket, payload