Patent ID: 8186145

Claim:
A vehicle, comprising; a payload; tractor rocket motors that are not installed at the base of the vehicle effective to generate thrust along a direction of flight of said vehicle; each tractor rocket motor having a nozzle at a forward end of the vehicle protruding from an exterior wall and angularly disposed towards said base with an aft surface of said tractor rocket motor adjacent to said exterior wall of said vehicle and an opposing fore surface of said tractor rocket motor radially outward of said aft surface, said aft surface extending toward said base for a lesser distance than an opposing fore surface; and said tractor rocket motors having a converging portion adjacent a source of subsonic propellant gas, a throat effective to accelerate said propellant gas to supersonic, said nozzle shaped to turn said gas through an angle by means of a plurality of Mach waves extending from an end of said aft surface to said fore surface.