AUCTION TO END SPACE QUEST ROTARY ROCKET TO SELL OFF ITS ASSETS, EXCEPT TEST CRAFT, AT MOJAVE AIRPORT.

Byline: Jim Skeen Staff Writer

MOJAVE - Rotary Rocket, a company whose investors included techno- thriller author Tom Clancy, will auction off its Mojave assets next month, signaling the apparent end of its bid to build a reusable spaceship.

A list of the assets to be sold Feb. 3 is on display at an Internet Web site for Tri-State Auction, a Bakersfield company that is handling the sale at the Mojave Airport.

The items range from a used Ford van to a collection of computer keyboards, but not the 65-foot-tall test aircraft the company built.

A spokesman at the company's office in San Bruno, Calif., said no decision had been made on what to do with the test craft.

The auction notice came just days after the company fended off a seizure notice from Kern County for failing to pay its property tax on time. Kern County issued a seizure notice on the plant on Dec. 26 and had planned to conduct its own auction, but the notice was rescinded the following week when Rotary Rocket paid the $19,000 it owed.

The company ceased operations at Mojave several weeks ago. It had been trying to raise more money, upward of $150 million, to continue its efforts to build a reusable spaceship.

Rotary Rocket was planning to build a spaceship called Roton, which would take off vertically and climb into space. On its return, Roton would extend helicopter-style rotary blades to slow itself down and land.

The company did build and fly a low-altitude vehicle that tested the concept of maneuvering with the rotary blades. The company spent about $5 million to build and test the vehicle, which resembles an upside-down ice cream cone.

Rotary Rocket had planned to build two more vehicles - a high-altitude test aircraft and an actual spaceship.