I'm absolutely positive someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the komet's engine essentially a giant bottle rocket? In other words, it was pretty much a 'light the fuse and clench up until it burns out' situation, as opposed to being able to adjust the flow/change the amount of thrust/turn it on or off?
It would seem to me if that's the case, it would be a much better equalizer for it to work how it actually did, wouldn't it? No more getting to alt, killing the engine, gliding for a couple passes and then turning the engine back on to set up for another pass/get away from the escorts.
Wiley.