Cross reference of pchapman & Redredrobin's efforts on the rumours thread.
From
New spaceship restoring hope after Virgin Galactic crash | Reuters
As the ship is rocketing upward, the tail is held fast by a large hook that is supposed to remain engaged until the craft reaches supersonic speed, Mike Moses, Virgin Galactic vice president of operations, explained in an interview with Reuters.
At that point, the pilots release the hook, though the tail remains pinned back by aerodynamic pressures. The command to actually move the tail into descent position comes after the rocket motor burns out, near the apex of the ship's altitude.
Unlocking the tail is done well before then so that if the mechanism fails, the pilots can abort the flight.
"It's a great safety feature, but if you use your safety feature in a regime that it's not designed to handle, bad things are going to happen," Moses said. "It's like your car airbag going off at 65 miles per hour."
@BOAC tell if you don't want this posting here and I'll delete it