Suggested Citation:
Sarigul-Klijn, Marti M., Nesrin Sarigul-Klijn, Gary Hudson, Bevin McKinney, Jim Voss, Phil Chapman, Bob Morgan, Jim Tighe, Jason Kramb, Ken Doyle, Mike Quayle, Charlie Brown (2008) Selection of a Carrier Aircraft and a Launch Method for Air Launching Space Vehicles. AIAA Space 2008 Conference and Exposition

This paper describes the flight simulation and selection study that Transformational Space Corporation (t/Space) conducted for the design of a carrier aircraft to launch an earth-to-orbit launch vehicle for NASA’s Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program. A new air launch method, called Trapeze-Lanyard Air Drop (t/LAD) launch, would be used to launch the rocket. Air launching simplifies operations as compared to ground launch from a fixed range in several ways and it also greatly improves the simplicity, safety, cost, and reliability of the booster.