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Trans. JSASS Space Tech. Japan Vol. 7, No. ists26, pp. Tg_1-Tg_10, 2009 U.S. Human Space Transportation Failures By E. Joe TOMEI and I-Shih CHANG The Aerospace Corporation, El Segundo, California, U.S.A. (Received April 17th, 2008) The U.S. human space transportation history from 1961 through 2007 is reviewed. Past and present U.S. human space programs and human space launch vehicles and spacecraft are briefly discussed. Category and chronological list of U.S. human space missions are presented. The emphasis of the study is on the investigation of mission failures and major anomalies encountered in the U.S. human space transportation history. Failures and major anomalies by part, root cause, element, function, domain, and component are analyzed. Failure outcome, failure mode, time of failure, and mission reliability relevant to flight safety analysis are examined. Findings and failure mitigation strategy are summarized. Key Words: Space Launch, Human Space Flight, Failure and Anomaly 1. Introduction (Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, Shuttle) are considered in the study. Related near-space and suborbital flights with X-15 To expand human presence, activity, and habitation and commercial suborbital flights with SpaceShipOne beyond Earth orbit, new launch vehicles and crew (SS1) rocketplanes are also included in the study. The exploration vehicles are being developed by several near-space is in the region between 80.5 and 100 km space-fairing nations for human space transportation. The altitude. U.S. astronaut wings are awarded for flights new vehicles will incorporate modern space technologies above 80.5 km (50 miles). to meet stringent requirements for crew safety in space Human space flight requires an expansion of space launch operation and space flight environment. transportation systems. For purposes of this study human Anticipated expansion in space tourism to low Earth orbit space flight can be categorized into several transportation would also contribute to increased demand for reliable phases. They are the launch phase, earth and lunar human space transportation systems. Human space launch on-orbit phases, lunar transfer and return phases, surface and flight are dangerous, expensive, and technically exploration phase, entry and landing phases, and lunar challenging. The success of this new endeavor relies upon ascent phase. Human space flight also includes static, the application of knowledge and experience gained from in-situ habitation phases both on the lunar surface and on prior human space programs. board space stations. There are also a variety of related The study is concerned with all U.S. human space topics worthy of investigation, including uncrewed flights missions and is a portion of a continuing effort 1)-14) to in support of human space flights (developmental, investigate the failure causes and corrective actions of the logistics, etc.), animal space flights, and human satellite world space launch and flight systems and to provide deployment. All of these are to be addressed by the larger lessons learned from the past in order to mitigate space project being undertaken. This paper will limit its mission failures in the future. The prior work has been discussion to the primary transportation phases. Several concentrated on launch vehicle failures. The current additional papers would be needed to contain all of the project is intended to examine the failure history of all collected material. human space flights focusing on transportation and is a The paper starts with a brief description of U.S. human subset of overall space missions. space transportation history, followed by category and The focus of the study is on human space mission chronological list of U.S. human space missions and failures and major anomalies in order to better understand identification of space mission failures and major the ramifications of the human space transportation record anomalies. Analysis of mission failures and anomalies by on the new human space programs. The objective of the part, root cause, element, function, domain, and study is to apply knowledge and experience gained from component are presented. Failure outcome, failure mode, prior U.S. human space programs to the development of time of failure, and mission reliability relevant to flight reliable human space transportation systems in the future. safety analysis are examined. Findings and failure mitigation strategy are summarized at end of the paper. 2. Overview 3. U.S. Human Space Transportation History This paper summarizes the history of U.S. human space transportation failures since the inception of the first Human space flight started when the USSR launched human space flight in 1961. Past and present U.S. the Vostok vehicle carrying Yuri Gagarin to a low-earth suborbital, orbital, and lunar human space launch systems orbit on 1961-04-12. Shortly afterwards, the U.S. (Redstone, Atlas, Titan, Saturn, Space Transportation launched a Redstone vehicle carrying Alan Shepard in a System [STS]) and their associated space flight systems Mercury capsule for a suborbital flight on 1961-05-05 and Copyright© 2009 by the Japan Society for Aeronautical and Space Sciences and ISTS. All rights reserved. Tg_1 Trans. JSASS Space Tech. Japan Vol. 7, No. ists26 (2009) an Atlas LV-3B carrying John Glenn for an orbital flight ascent to earth orbit and as a spaceplane for the rest of the on 1962-02-20. In addition to low-earth-orbit flights, the mission. The Space Shuttle is still in use today, but is U.S. is the only country that has conducted human lunar planned to be retired in 2010. In addition, the X-15 flights with the mighty Saturn V rocket and Apollo rocketplane program started in 1955, flew its first human spacecraft and landed the first humans, Neil Armstrong near-space flight in 1962, suborbital flight in 1963, and and Buzz Aldrin on the Moon launching on 1969-07-16. ended in 1968. Recently, the first privately developed The U.S. human orbital space programs include human rocketplane SS1 successfully completed three Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, and Shuttle. The Mercury suborbital flights in 2004. program started in 1958. The first human suborbital Other than the successful programs mentioned in the mission with a Mercury/Redstone was carried out in 1961. previous paragraph, there were also cancelled human The orbital mission with a Mercury/Atlas was carried out space programs, namely Man-In-Space-Soonest in 1962; and the last Mercury/Atlas occurred in 1963. The (1957-1958), X-20 Dyna-Soar (1957-1963), Manned Gemini program started in 1962 and extended the U.S. Orbiting Laboratory (1963-1969), X-30 NASP human space program to two-man space flights to develop (1990-1993), and X-33/Venturestar (1996-2001). multi-human capsule, extravehicular operations, and Currently, there are new human space programs under rendezvous and docking techniques critical to the Apollo development in the U.S.: NASA Constellation program, lunar program. The first Gemini/Titan II human orbital Virgin Galactic (U.K.) sponsored SpaceShipTwo project, mission was carried out in 1965; and the last occurred in and XCOR Aerospace Lynx program. The space 1966. Gemini included dual launches of Gemini habitation programs involving Skylab (1973-1974) and spacecraft from Titan II launch vehicles with Atlas/Agena International Space Station (1993-present) are part of the target vehicles to allow on-orbit rendezvous operations. overall project, but will not be considered in this paper. The Apollo program started in 1961 and was devoted to Fig. 1 shows the U.S. human space launch systems and land humans on the Moon and bring them safely back to spacecraft. The Redstone rocket was used for suborbital Earth. The first human orbital mission with an and the Atlas for orbital space launches of the Mercury Apollo/Saturn IB was carried out in 1968, and the first spacecraft. The Titan II rocket was used for orbital space lunar orbital mission with an Apollo/Saturn V occurred in launches of the Gemini spacecraft. The Saturn I vehicle 1968. The first lunar landing mission with the Apollo 11 was used for suborbital, and the Saturn IB and V for was conducted in 1969. The Apollo program ended after orbital space launches of the Apollo spacecraft. The the launch of a Saturn IB vehicle in 1975. The Space Apollo spacecraft included a Lunar Module for Shuttle program started in 1972 and was dedicated to landing/habitation/ascent and a Lunar Rover for surface develop a space transportation system (STS) that can exploration. The STS consists of Space Shuttle, External shuttle repeatedly from Earth to orbit and back. The first Tank, Solid Rocket Booster (SRB) and was used to launch human orbital mission with shuttle Columbia was carried the Shuttle to low-earth orbit. The Shuttle payload bay can out in 1981. The Space Shuttle is a unique dual mode accommodate upper-stages for delivering satellites to vehicle that serves as part of the launch vehicle during higher orbits. Shown also in the figure are the X-15 and Fig . 1. U.S. human space launch vehicles, spacecraft, lunar module and rover (drawings reprinted courtesy of NASA) Tg_2 E. J. TOMEI and I-S. CHANG: U.S. Human Space Transportation Failures SS1 rocketplanes. The X-15 was air launched from a B-52 and an assortment of other historical data references aircraft at 14 km for conducting hypersonic research and published by The Aerospace Corporation and other evaluating pilot performance and physiology during exit organizations 15)-43). A significant part of the database from and reentry to the atmosphere. The SS1 was air compilation process consists of reviewing and comparing launched from the White Knight carrier vehicle at 14 km the various sources, identifying conflicts and resolving and was the first successful privately funded human inconsistencies. The data entries have been populated for suborbital reusable rocketplane.
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