Is a space elevator with wings feasible? (engineering, not economic concerns)
Consider a very conveniently placed asteroid in orbit around the earth, and we hang the space elevator off of that. It doesn't have to be at the geostationary altitude but it would probably help if it was (I think).
The elevator is made of 2 ribbons, with (at an optimal altitude) a sequence of wings between them, it looks like a ladder of wings. The elevator is going at a fairly high speed relative to the earth and in a region with little wind, maybe somewhere near the equator.
As far as I can tell the main issues are still with the strength of the ribbon, it will need to be strong enough to handle the drag force and the weight, but hopefully the weight issue will have been significantly reduced by adding wings. It would be dangerous to have this thing even come close to the ground, so you would have to dock with it from an aircraft. You would want the docking part significantly lower than the wings because the downwash would be monstrous.
Oh and of course it would need some way to prevent bird strikes, I feel like they might notice a giant structure flying through the air but those idiots hit 747s we can't trust them.
a) Once one gets the asteroid in place is this idea impossible to manufacture? Or just unreasonably expensive?
b) have I missed anything important in my considerations?
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