Documents / Report
This final report, dated September 10, 1996, was prepared by the Research Triangle Institute for the Department of the Air Force's 45th and 30th Space Wing safety offices. Titled Modeling Unlikely Space-Booster Failures in Risk Calculations, it shows how rare Mode-5 failures, in which a rocket veers well off its intended flight line, are modeled in the DAMP risk-analysis program. An appendix lists Atlas, Delta, Titan and Thor launch and failure histories through August 1996.
From the source: Release of 2026-05-08 Incident: 9/10/96, N/A. This report describes the Modeling of Unlikely Space-Booster Failures in Risk Calculations, documenting historical launch failure modes and recommending corrective actions to address them using novel modelling techniques.
A good illustration of a Mode-5 failure response occurred during launch of Prospector (Joust) on the Eastern Range in-June 1991. The Joust consists of a single-stage Castor IV-A solid-propellant rocket motor and a payload module. The "vehicle made a radical pitch-up maneuver due to· aft-skirt structural failure at approximately T+14 Seconds." 121 The vacuum instantaneous impact trace from the RSO console is shown in Figure 1. If the safety officer had taken destruct action during the time interval from 18 to 25 seconds, impact would have been well away from the flight line. CYIER A UNCLRSSIFIED IP "AP 1 JOUST1761-R r20SEC. + 3 □.□+ 3 □ .a . . PP.rttE I. 17B RLTEP. CNH!AVE53 SKIN ON TRRCK .. . ........ .... ON TRACK 1. D DELAY ~• _._:,.--25SEC. 1 .II DELAY ',• r1BSEC. .::---,--- \"·./ ~-••••30SEC. +· 12 CHEV . . . 15 CHEV t • • \ • ■ ...... ~-. '\ .... 16.3 !iLO19.7 5LO !II .1 5HT a. 1 RGT 32.2 SltT 15SEC. Q.7 LFT ~ 1 LOU~-2 LOIi \ \ 78 HDG 625 VEL 2 ALT l ! .......--.. D. I 1l / --•-=--.-,,,•' CNTRAVE'i!--.. --, . ·-SKIN . i ·; ON TRRU ON TRACKI I 0 0 5 DELAY I ' . 0.5 DELAY f iI i + 4 GREEN Figure 1. Joust Impact Trace Showing a Mode-5 Failure Response As still another example of a Mode-5 failure response, a guided Red Tigress sounding rocket was launched from Pad 20 at Cape Canaveral on 20 Aug 91. Within a second or two after clearing the launcher, the rocket made a near 90° right tum, and flew stably in this direction until destroyed by the safety officer at 23.3 seconds. Pieces impacted some two or three miles from the launch pad. This failure might have been classified as a Mode-2 response if destruct action had been taken·shortly after launch. 9/10/96 6 RTI
Not linked to a story yet.
Report, from the pursue collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 181 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.