Vertical Take Off and Landing aircraft or short take off and landing aircraft generally burn through significant amounts of fuel often limiting the mission. Many smaller Navy Attack ships do not have large decks to launch by lateral horizontal catapult.

I Propose a cone shaped laser take off system for VTOL and STOL safety aboard Navy Vessels. This will equate to safety quickly moving the VTOL craft up to 88 feet above the deck and away from the ship. This will also save the much needed fuel to break ground for the Vertical and Short Take Off and Landing Aircraft, thus allowing doe greater range. At the height of 88 feet off the deck plus the height of the shift will put the aircraft at transitional altitude for forward flight. This device makes sense for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, which are changing the battlespace also. This system is to viewed as a vertical catapult launch system or VCLS.

These cones will be maneuvered underneath the Attack or rescue Helicopter or VTOL lift off point, various sizes for various aircraft. The cones will be set on a plate at a point on the center of gravity of the aircraft. The cones will have holes on the bottom the size of garden hoses in which high-energy lasers will be pointed inside and reflected off the deck where a reflective plate is and into the center of the cone. Or the laser will be shot directly through a hole in the bottom of the deck. The inside of the cones will be lined with reflective material. When the laser energy inside the cone reaches critical mass then be unhooked and unlatched from the deck and it will launch the cone with the aircraft on top at the c.g. to the 88 feet needed to clear the safety zone.

The top three feet of the cone will remain with aircraft and then shape change into a flat aerodynamic saucer wing or the entire cone will launch with the aircraft attached to a cable and then fall back to the deck with parachutes as the cable is quickly retracted back to the launching point. The cone will then be re-positioned for the next launch.

This design is one of thousands of potential designs to better the systems, which assist the human endeavor in the mind of Lance Winslow. Do you also have ideas, concepts and theories on better mousetraps, which can help the forward progression of mankind? Think on it, they will come to you.

"Lance Winslow" - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/