*The following is archival content from 2003, hosted on the original X PRIZE website, to maintain authenticity.

Propulsion: Jet and Rocket Engines Ship Name: Ascender Team Leader: David Ashford Location: Bristol, England, United Kingdom Launch: Conventional Runway Landing: Conventional Runway Website: www.bristolspaceplanes.com Team Overview

Quote from David Ashford

"The X PRIZE is doing great things to dent the mindset that is the biggest obstacle to an explosion of creativity in space."

Flight Sequence

Ascender is designed to be the first sub-orbital aeroplane since the X-15, and the first ever to carry passengers to space. During the air-breathing phase of flight, Ascender is powered by two Williams -Rolls FJ44 turbojets. Each is rated for a takeoff thrust of 1,900 lb (force). The rocket engine installed in Ascender is a Pratt & Whitney RL 10 which uses hydrogen and liquid oxygen to deliver approximately 20,000 lb (force) of thrust. Ascender will carry a crew of two and two passengers (or other payload) to space and back.

Passengers will experience two minutes of weightlessness, will see superb views of Earth, and will see the sky turn black even in daytime. It takes off from an ordinary airfield using its turbofan engine and climbs at subsonic speed to a height of 8 km. The pilot then starts the rocket engine and pulls up into a steep climb. When the rocket fuel is used up Ascender is climbing close to the vertical at a speed of Mach 2.8, from which it coasts to a maximum height of 100 km. Ascender then enters a steep dive. On reaching the atmosphere the pilot pulls out of the dive and flies back to the airfield from which he took off 30 minutes previously.