Page "HOTOL" Paragraph 4

HOTOL would have been 63 metres long, 12. 8 metres high, 7 metres in diameter and with a wingspan of 28. 3 metres.

The unmanned craft was intended to put a payload of around 7 to 8 tonnes in orbit, at 300 km altitude.

It was intended to take off from a runway, mounted on the back of a large rocket-boosted trolley that would help get the craft up to " working speed ".

The engine was intended to switch from jet propulsion to pure rocket propulsion at 26 – 32 km high, by which time the craft would be travelling at Mach 5 to 7.

After reaching orbit, HOTOL was intended to re-enter the atmosphere and glide down to land on a conventional runway ( approx 1, 500 metres minimum ).

HOTOL was designed for automatic, unmanned flights, although later stages would reintroduce a pilot.

The internal landing gear would have been too small to carry the weight of the fully fueled rocket, so emergency landings would have required the fuel to be dumped.