Apollo Launch Abort System Test

What people said

JshWright · 2019-03 · Recommendation

The tower style launch escape system works in flight as well. Here's a video explaining how it works, with footage of it being tested during the Apollo era. [VIDEO]

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ceejayoz · 2023-12 · Reference

> how come people with sliding rulers and navigation computers 'knitted' by local grannies have lost 0 Saturn rockets. The fuck? NASA lost people in production hardware multiple times. [LINK] [LINK] "The damaged third-stage engine failed to restart for trans-lunar injection... Despite the engine failures, the flight provided NASA with enough confidence to use the Saturn V for crewed launches..." [LINK] [LINK] [LINK] Here's a fun one: They tested the Saturn crew escape system. The booster was supposed to blow up, and demonstrate the crew would survive... but the test went wrong , and it blew up early , when it shouldn't have. The crew abort worked, so test failed successfully . [VIDEO]

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ceejayoz · 2023-12 · Reference

> If a test flight doesn't achieve the testing objectives, that's a failure. Incorrect. Examples: [VIDEO] is a Saturn launch abort test that failed. It failed in a way that they were able to determine that intended test would have worked, though. [LINK] also failed to achieve its objectives; "Despite the engine failures, the flight provided NASA with enough confidence to use the Saturn V for crewed launches; a potential third uncrewed flight was cancelled." All that aside, SpaceX was quite clear that the latest Starship test had multiple objectives, and that "successfully splashdown near Hawaii" was deemed quite unlikely. It successfully demonstrated a number of items, including fairly critically the launchpad changes.

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