Headquartered in Frisco, Texas,[1] the goal of the company was to build and operate a privately developed heavy lift orbital launch vehicle.
[3] On March 4, 2000, Beal Aerospace conducted a successful test firing of the BA-2 rocket engine, the largest since the NASA Apollo program.
This combination was selected in order to avoid the expense and complexity of cryogenic storage, and to reduce development costs.
Kerosene was injected into the hot steam and oxygen exhaust products of catalytically decomposed hydrogen peroxide, resulting in spontaneous ignition.
All three stages of the BA-2 vehicle were to be pressure-fed using high-pressure helium storage to replace the expense and complexity of turbopumps.