NASA's rollercoaster escape for Ares I

[jamie_young]

I so want to ride on this! <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /><br /><br />http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/content/?cid=4840

 

[qso1]

Looks like it'll get the astronauts down almost as fast as they would go up. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[flynn]

Cool, anyone else got images of Astronauts grabbing a big inflatbale tyre and diving onto a water chute?<br /><br />WEEEeeee. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <font color="#800080">"All God does is watch us and kill us when we get boring. We must never, ever be boring" - <strong>Chuck Palahniuk</strong>.</font> </div>

 

[SpaceKiwi]

Very interesting article, thanks. I share your enthusiasm to give it a try, though that's unlikely to ever happen. And, not nearly interesting enough for a theme park to replicate it. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><em><font size="2" color="#ff0000">Who is this superhero?  Henry, the mild-mannered janitor ... could be!</font></em></p><p><em><font size="2">-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</font></em></p><p><font size="5">Bring Back The Black!</font></p> </div>

 

[halman]

If the bottom of the track makes as tight a curve as the illustration, the car(s) could pull more g's than the rocket would. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> The secret to peace of mind is a short attention span. </div>

 

[subzero788]

Nice! Maybe NASA will make some money selling tickets to this thing on the side? <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" />

 

[barrykirk]

They could hire Univeral Studios to do the advertising and billboards and to manage the ride....LOL

 

[halman]

BarryKirk,<br /><br />Not being a rocket scientist, I am uncertain under what circumstances such an escape system would be used. The words "This thing is gonna blow" don't seem to be used in rocketry very often, at least, not recorded for prosterity. The ones that have been recorded tend to be more along the lines of "Uh oh!" (Dick Scobee's last words.) Even the on-pad aborts I have heard about have not resulted in the crew using the escape system. They just sit there, waiting for the launch crew to get things under control. ("We're just sitting here breathing, Cape.")<br /><br />But, I guess that the public wants to believe that there is always a way out, so a few million gets spent coming up with a wild ride to avoid a Wild Ride. In reality, things happen way too fast for unbuckling straps, climbing out of seats, opening hatches, crawling through said hatches, and then vacating the premises. Even if the the 145 people on the 737 that just went down in Brazil had each had parachutes, probably they all still would have died. Even ejection seats aren't always fast enough.<br /><br />We insist on extreme safety measures for people who expect to take great risks, yet most people do not have a one day supply of water on hand in case of earthquake, broken pipes, contamination, or flood. It is far more dangerous to get into an automobile than it is to ride the space shuttle, yet most people would consider the family car to be utterly safe. Maybe this is because they believe that they HAVE to drive, but space exploration is a voluntary activity. Someday, I want to go for a drive with my motorcycle helmet on to see what kind of reactions I get. I wonder if I would get pulled over? <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> The secret to peace of mind is a short attention span. </div>

 

[docm]

One possible use: a pad fire unrelated to the rocket approaching the bird, given a decent warning. EX: a truck fire etc. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[josh_simonson]

>It is far more dangerous to get into an automobile than it is to ride the space shuttle, yet most people would consider the family car to be utterly safe.<br /><br />I don't know what car you're driving, but mine is several orders of magnitude safer than STS by any measure.<br /><br />How long do you think you would live if your commuted to work in the STS every day? I bet you'd be dead by spring.

 

[vonster]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>t is far more dangerous to get into an automobile than it is to ride the space shuttle<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br /><br />Statistically this is completely wrong. Where are you getting this idea from?<br /><br />.

 

[vulture2]

Realistically it is hard to see how any major contingency can occur before main engine ignition, and once ignition has ocurred (the CLV has a solid propellant first stage, which has "no" off switch) pad egress is obviously not possible. (Liquid fueled vehicles can occasionally shut down between ignition and liftoff.) <br /><br />So an emergency ground egress system for the Ares is very unlikely to ever actually be used. That said, it falls into the category of things that one has to have to achieve "man rating".

 

[lunatic133]

I'm pretty sure it used to be true a few years ago. Columbia doubled the number of space shuttle accidents which through off the statistics quite a bit. In truth, there haven't been enough shuttle flights in comparisson with car rides to really make an accurate judgment on the matter. I seem to remember some hugely complicated equation that determines shuttle safety compared to car safety or commercial airplane safety but it had all kinds of unknowns and wasn't very accurate. I can't remember all the details about how it worked, though.

 

[bushuser]

The STS probably comes out safer than the family car if you view the problem in terms of "accidents per passenger mile." <br /><br />This would be an example of "How To Lie With Statistics."<br /><br />But seriously, I think the enclosed giant slide escape makes more sense than the roller coaster. The first guys to the roller coaster cannot leave until all the stragglers catch up. In an emergency, they may be uncertain how many passengers they should be waiting for! The tube would be enclosed for some fire protection, and air can be pumped in from the bottom to flush out noxious gases.

 

[barrykirk]

halman,<br /><br />I already posted the circumstances that such an escape system could be used.<br /><br />It could be used to generate revenue by selling tickets for the ride....<br /><br />Universal Studios could manage it and make it a profit center for NASA which could then use that money to pay for other space activities.<br /><br />Better yet, have a lottery, winning tickets would get a ride to the ISS. Losing tickets would still get a ride.

 

[barrykirk]

Wouldn't it just be safer if necessary to fire the CES rocket than to use the roller coaster?<br /><br />Couple of assumptions here.<br /><br />1) The capsule that the astronauts launch in is really safe. Any threat to the lives of the crew come from something external to the capsule.<br /><br />2) The CES can be fired with the rocket on the ground and get the crew safely down.<br /><br />3) It would take a lot less time in case of emergency to fire off the CES than to get the crew to the coaster.

 

[CalliArcale]

Not sure about the safety of a pad abort, but it would definitely be expensive. I'd say that if the contingency were something like a nitrogen tetroxide leak (nasty, nasty stuff), the roller coaster would be the way to go. That's something that could happen between the time the pad is evacuated and ignition.<br /><br />Lots of escape methods are devised and practised despite the fact that there are very few modes in which they will be useful. (Such as how to bail out after ditching in the sea, which is very possibly not survivable anyway.) It's a boy scout logic: Be Prepared. After all, isn't it better (generally) to have a means of escape and never need to use it than to assume that particular failure mode is too unlikely and then have the crew perish? <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><font color="#666699"><em>"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff."</em>  -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink"</font></p> </div>

 

[halman]

josh_simpson,<br /><br />Well, I could base it upon per-passenger-mile statistics, as the shuttle has traveled billions of miles, with a total of 14 deaths, wheras automotive safety figures indicate 1.3 deaths per million passenger miles.<br /><br />I would not include the Challenger accident if I had my druthers, because that was operating the vehicle outside of parameters. Highway safety statistics do not include NASCAR fatalities because NASCAR is outside of highway driving parameters.<br /><br />A statitistic I found to be very sobering was that 1 in 10 Americans will be involved in an automobile accident where someone dies or is severely injured. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> The secret to peace of mind is a short attention span. </div>

 

[mrmorris]

<font color="yellow">"Well, I could base it upon..."</font><br /><br />Halman -- normally you create high-quality posts and I enjoy reading them. However, the shuttle-car safety statistic you quoted was just <b>wrong</b>. Defending it doesn't make it look any better. There's simply no way you can favorably compare the safety of automobiles vs. the shuttle without using ridiculous comparisons (like mileage). The NASCAR analogy is silly. In automobile terms, Challenger was equivalent to taking a car out on an icy road without snow tires or chains. You can't simply write it off just because it was caused in part by stupidity.<br /><br />Even if the Challenger and Columbia tragedies had not occurred, I'd argue that there were not enough flights to truly make the statement you did. I forget the total number of shuttle flights to date -- I think it's less than 100. If I were to randomly choose 100 people starting out on a trip in their car -- the chance that any of the drivers in that group would have an accident <b>on that trip</b> would be considerably less than 50%. Car accidents simply don't happen that often. The reason there are so many car accidents is because of the incredibly huge numbers of car trips occurring every day. If there had been a million shuttle flights to date, then you could make meaningful comparisons between the safety of cars trips and shuttle flights.<br /><br />Given that the Challenger and Columbia tragedies *did* occur, there's simply no reasonable way in which to favorably compare the shuttle's safety to that of an automobile.

 

[bushuser]

Please unwad your panties <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /><br /><br />Like I said, this is a great example of How To Lie With Statistics. We do notsuggest cars are more dangerous than space travel, but I can manipulate numbers to make it appear so. Now, you could seriously argue that Soyuz is not much more dangerous than a car.

 

[mrmorris]

<font color="yellow">"Like I said..."</font><br /><br />I don't know who you are -- don't care what you said, and wasn't talking to you.<br /><br />It's possible to argue about anything. It's also possible to be wrong about anything. Some truly gifted individuals are wrong about just about everything.

 

[vulture2]

>>>There are dozens of scenarios where getting away from the pad before ignition would be a good idea. Just a few, would include a toxics release, or APU problem, cryogenic leak or pressure problem, electrical fire, ....<br /><br />IMHO the Ares should use simple and reliable pneumatic actuators, like every rocket except the Shuttle, rather than complicated and expensive APUs. I can't imagine why anyone would order an emergency egress for any of the problems you mention. After hatch closure the crew is safer in the vehicle.<br /><br />And it isn't a credible contingency. During crew boarding the cryo tanks are in stable replenish and venting continuously, and the hypergolic tanks are shut and sealed. There is simply nothing going on. <br /><br />Moreover, prior to hatch closure, the egress system doesn't protect the final inspection team, since they are usually not on the one level where the egress system can be boarded, nor does it help the closeout crew if they are halfway off the structure. <br /><br />Finally, there just isn't a failure mode where the rocket will blow up, but not for five minutes. A rocket has not blown up _prior_ to ignition since the Nedelin catastrophe of 1960, and in that incident there was no warning whatever and ground egress would have been impossible. <br />

 

[halman]

mrmorris,<br /><br />Okay, I'll admit it. I am biased against automobiles. Partly because about 50,000 Americans die every year in them, and hundreds of thousands are seriously injured, and partly because they are the most inefficient method known to man to move people around. I would be willing to bet that every one on this board knows someone who has either been killed in a car wreck, or seriously injured. Many people believe that fatal accidents only happen on the highway, but that is wrong. A couple of weeks ago, someone in my community died when she pulled out in front of a car on a city street.<br /><br />Passenger miles are the standard method of judging the relative safety of various types of transportation, as well as efficiency. The Atlantis racked up over 70,000,000 passenger miles on its last mission. The Apollo 1 crew died without ever leaving the pad, due to unfamiliararity with pure oxygen environments at sea level pressure. The Challenger incident was like loosening the steering wheel, cutting the brake hoses, and putting a brick on the accelerator before starting the car. There was no way it was going fly, and a lot of people knew it. Columbia was like putting a set of tires with the steel cords showing on a car before heading out on the interstate.<br /><br />NASA engineers were aware that the Solid Rocket Booster O-ring seals were burning through, sometimes both completely, but it wasn't happening until just before the end of the burn, when the pressure was considerably less then at ignition. The fact that a jet of gas was spurting from the side of one of the SRB's seconds after ignition indicated that the O-rings had never seated properly, which was due to the cold, not a design defect. If there had not been intense pressure on NASA to launch that January day, we would probably still be using boosters with only 2 O-rings.<br /><br />If there had been no evidence whatsoever, historic or photographic, of foam from the External Tank striking the <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> The secret to peace of mind is a short attention span. </div>

 

[mrmorris]

<font color="yellow">"If a friend of yours insisted on driving on bald tires in an area where ice and snow were common, would you blame the automobile when he died in it? "</font><br /><br />So I take it from this that you only wish to include in the statistics of automobile accidents those which are caused by a design or manufacturing defect of the car itself? If we rule out all of the car accidents that are the results of one or more drivers (or if you wish to extend the metaphor -- the manager of the driver in question) doing something stupid, careless, etc. -- we're left with... a heckuva lot fewer car accidents. Even in your statement about the recent death -- the explanation was "...she pulled out in front of a car on a city street". Should we then blame the automobile for her death?<br /><br />I have said <b>nothing</b> about the flaws or lack thereof in the Space Shuttle. I am taking issue with the statement you made regarding the safety of cars vs the shuttle system. Specifically, you posted: <i>"It is far more dangerous to get into an automobile than it is to ride the space shuttle, yet most people would consider the family car to be utterly safe."</i><br /><br />Statistics show that without a <b>lot</b> of qualifiers that you did not make -- that statement is obviously false.

 

[vulture2]

"Finally, there just isn't a failure mode where the rocket will blow up, but not for five minutes. "<br /><br /> />>>You are not correct. There are many such failure modes. The failure modes are different for each launch vehicle.<br /><br />Could you please name a few cases where it was _known_ five minutes in advance that a vehicle would blow up on the pad, but nothing could be done to stop it? Or even provide a realistic theoretical scenario?<br /><br /> />>true, however after hatch closure the vehicle does have a lot going on, especially as it get near T-0. <br /><br />There is a lot going on electronically, but other than bringing the cryo tanks to flight pressure and starting the APUs (if any) little happens that could be hazardous until ignition. Once again, at this point the hatch is closed and I can't imagine a contingency where the crew would open it before the vehicle was safed.<br /><br /> />>>So you propose no escape system because EVERYBODY can not escape? <br /><br />I would suggest a high-speed elevator that can be used every day, _with_ stops on each of the major levels. This would provide escape for anyone, on any day, not just prior to launch. (There have been at least five fatalities on LC-39, none of them on launch day.) It would also make it faster for fire crews to respond to an emergency on the structure, and even save time for the astronauts in getting on board. If you want blast protection just add one extra stop - in the basement.<br /><br />