Delta-IV
Well-Known Member
On my 4th flight of my beautiful Saturn 1B it encountered a launch anomaly.
Just after liftoff it was easy to see in real-time that my capsule and tower was slightly pointing off center. Then during the fly out it seemed to flying fairly straight and I thought "no harm, no foul". When the time for the parachute deployment near apogee, nothing happened and it at first fell flat then about 200 feet up it pointed itself nose down. The capsule had separated but the parachute hanging almost out of the sustainer was noticed real-time.
My cheap Casio camera was able to capture the forensics I needed. The capsule had actually separated during fly out and the aero forces probably prevented the complete deployment.
On the good side, luckily the transition is the only part completely destroyed. The upper stage tube just broke the seal between the motor tube and slid down into the cavernous main tube with just superficial damage. One thing that probably helped it was I added a aluminum tape wrap around the forward end to simulate the shinny metal of the Service Module.
Just after liftoff it was easy to see in real-time that my capsule and tower was slightly pointing off center. Then during the fly out it seemed to flying fairly straight and I thought "no harm, no foul". When the time for the parachute deployment near apogee, nothing happened and it at first fell flat then about 200 feet up it pointed itself nose down. The capsule had separated but the parachute hanging almost out of the sustainer was noticed real-time.
My cheap Casio camera was able to capture the forensics I needed. The capsule had actually separated during fly out and the aero forces probably prevented the complete deployment.
On the good side, luckily the transition is the only part completely destroyed. The upper stage tube just broke the seal between the motor tube and slid down into the cavernous main tube with just superficial damage. One thing that probably helped it was I added a aluminum tape wrap around the forward end to simulate the shinny metal of the Service Module.
