2. INTRODUCTION
• Antares, known during early development as Taurus II, is an expendable launch system developed by Orbital Sciences
Corporation. Able to launch payloads heavier than 5,000 kg (11,000 lb) into low-Earth orbit, it made its inaugural
flight on April 21, 2013.
• Designed to launch the Cygnus spacecraft to the International Space Station as part of NASA's COTS
and CRS programs, Antares is the largest rocket operated by Orbital Sciences.
• NASA awarded Orbital a Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) Space Act Agreement (SAA) in 2008 to
demonstrate delivery of cargo to the International Space Station.
• For these COTS missions Orbital intends to use Antares to launch its Cygnus spacecraft. In addition, Antares will
compete for small-to-medium missions.
• Antares made four successful launches to orbit in its first five attempts.
• On October 28, 2014, an Antares rocket exploded just after liftoff, completely destroying the vehicle and
damaging launch pad 0 at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport.
• A range-safety officerreported having observed clear signs that the launch was in trouble, and effected planned
destruction of the mission.
3.
4. DESIGN
• The first stage uses RP-1 (kerosene) and liquid oxygen (LOX) as propellants, powering
twoAerojet AJ26 engines, which are modified Soviet-built NK-33 engines.
• Together they produce 3,265 kilonewtons (734,000 lbf) of thrust at sea level and 3,630 kN
(816,100 lbf) in vacuum.
• As Orbital has little experience with large liquid stages and LOX propellant, some of the
Antares first stage work was contracted to the Ukrainian Yuzhnoye SDO, designers of
theZenit series.
• The second stage is a solid-fuel rocket, the Castor 30. Developed by ATK as a derivative of the
Castor 120 solid stage, the Castor 30B produces 293.4 kN (65,960 lbf) average and 395.7 kN
(88,960 lbf) maximum thrust, and uses electromechanical thrust vectorcontrol.
• Antares' Castor 30 solid stage was based on the Castor 120 solid motor used as Minotaur-C's
first stage.
5.
6. WHY NASA BLEW UP ANTARE
• Every time NASA launches a rocket, two safety officers have one weighty decision: They
have to decide whether to push a self-destruct button if it appears the launch is going awry.
• If they make the wrong call either way, bad things can happen. Destroy a rocket
prematurely, and millions of dollars in equipment and research go up in flames
unnecessarily.
• Allow a malfunctioning rocket to continue, and the lives of people near the launch site could
be at risk.
• Tuesday night, I saw what happens when they make the right call.
• A 139-foot-tall (43 meters) Antares rocket malfunctioned shortly after takeoff, and was
destroyed in a massive explosion at the launch site after safety officers sent a kill signal.
• The glow from the accident was visible for miles up and down the coast, but because of the
safeguards in place, no one was injured.
7.
8. CONTD…
• The flight safety officer and the range safety officer are tasked with deciding whether a
rocket is operating properly and either disabling it for safety reasons or letting it
proceed.
• There can be just seconds to decide, and there is no instant replay.
• For reasons still being investigated, the rocket started behaving erratically and
exploded in a mountain of flame and smoke.
• This inferno burned across an otherwise picturesque post-sunset sky, accented high
above the horizon to my right by a sliver of a crescent moon.
• The explosion happened after safety officers, watching for any of ten specified
problems, such as a gross deviation from the flight path, sent a signal from the flight
termination system to disable the rocket, although damage from the malfunction may
have already doomed it to collapse back to Earth.
9.
10. • Even a successful launch produces an incredible amount of smoke and fire as the thrust
pushes a 652,000-pound (296,000-kilogram) rocket out of the atmosphere.
• In this failed launch, fuel that was meant to burn off gradually instead exploded in a
ferocious fireball.
• Spirals of flame fanned out from the launchpad in all directions as the controlled burn
gave way to chaos.
• As the overpressure pushed out from the launchpad, I could feel the explosion as well as
see it.
• Elsewhere, the same shock wave knocked two spectators off the bed of their pickup truck
and another off her dock.
• The blast broke windows and imploded doors in buildings close to the launch site.
