According to members of the NASA advisory committee on the maintenance of the International Space Station (ISS), the launch of new launch vehicles of the American company SpaceX with a crew on board can entail very serious consequences associated with the occurrence of a dangerous situation. In addition, this contradicts the safety regulations of existing manned space flights, the rules of which have been in force for more than 50 years.
As the experts explained, the fuel used by SpaceX, cooled to an ultra-low temperature, implies the launch of the rocket within half an hour after the start of refueling, which prevents the crew members from taking their seats in the capsule ship, which is installed on board the rocket, in time.
Recall that to this day, SpaceX has launched its ships without people on board, but the company intends to do so in the future.
Rocket explosion and ISS supply
Since 2012, with the help of SpaceX's Dragon ship, cargo has been successfully delivered to the ISS several times. According to plans, after 2-3 years, Dragon will be able to take on board and people. To date, the Falcon 9 launch vehicle is used to launch the vehicle into Earth's orbit. SpaceX has already managed to carry out a controlled descent of the lower stage of the launch vehicle to an offshore platform in the Atlantic Ocean four times.
However, NASA experts remind that one should not forget about the accident of the Falcon 9 launch vehicle, which occurred in early September this year. According to the official version of representatives of the Space X company, an anomalous failure occurred during the refueling process, in no way associated with a manufacturing defect.
At the moment, developers are trying to understand how a reservoir of helium interacts with the surrounding liquid oxygen, cooled to an ultra-low temperature. It should be noted that until now liquid oxygen in the space industry has not been used in such heavy rockets as the Falcon 9. Now the company will have to rely solely on its own limited experience in this area.
Representatives of the company support the version of the anomaly during refueling, because it will help them to resume launches of carrier rockets without lengthy delays. A design defect or a manufacturing defect will entail a lot of quality checks on all media assemblies, which will increase the duration of the production process.
In the entire 14-year history of the company, the biggest failure of its head, Elon Musk, calls the accident that occurred on September 1 at the launch pad at Cape Canaveral, when a rocket with the Israeli communications satellite Amos-6 exploded. Despite the fact that no one was hurt, the owner of the destroyed satellite, Space Communication, intends to demand from SpaceX $ 50 million in compensation or a free launch in connection with the loss of Amos-6.
At the moment, the information is as follows: taking into account the consequences of the accident, all launches of a heavy Falcon 9 rocket have been postponed indefinitely.
