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posted by takyon on Thursday December 13 2018, @03:53PM   Printer-friendly
from the ready-set-no dept.

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984

Delta 4-Heavy countdown aborted moments before launch – Spaceflight Now

A dramatic automatic abort 7.5 seconds before the planned liftoff of a United Launch Alliance Delta 4-Heavy rocket Saturday night kept the towering launcher on the pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, with a top secret spy payload for the National Reconnaissance Office.

The 233-foot-tall (71-meter) rocket was counting down to launch at 8:15 p.m. PST Saturday (11:15 p.m. EST; 0415 GMT Sunday), but an automated sequencer detected a technical issue and triggered an abort. "Hold hold hold," a member of the ULA launch team declared on the countdown net.

[...] In the statement, ULA said the abort was "due to an unexpected condition during terminal count at approximately 7.5 seconds before liftoff. "The team is currently reviewing all data and will determine the path forward. A new launch date will be provided when available," ULA said.

takyon: A new date has not been chosen yet.


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  • (Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday December 13 2018, @06:32PM (3 children)

    by bob_super (1357) on Thursday December 13 2018, @06:32PM (#774069)

    "normal" rockets have mostly used solid boosters.
    Once you're at full power, you're definitely not aborting, because them solids ain't stopping until they're done burning, and the only variable left is how many seconds it takes to get there (and by extension how many pieces fall back to the ground).

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  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 13 2018, @07:32PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 13 2018, @07:32PM (#774093)

    This is part of the reason why the space shuttle fired up the main engines just under 7 seconds before SRB ignition. During those ~7 seconds the launch can still be aborted if there's a problem detected in the main engines. This actually happened 5 times during the space shuttle program.

    After SRB ignition the shuttle had no possible abort modes for just over 2 minutes, which turned out to be a problem once.

  • (Score: 2) by legont on Thursday December 13 2018, @07:45PM

    by legont (4179) on Thursday December 13 2018, @07:45PM (#774096)

    Yeah, but that's because rocket design is not mature enough. It is impossible to build truly safe device with limitations like this.

    --
    "Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
  • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday December 13 2018, @08:06PM

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Thursday December 13 2018, @08:06PM (#774108) Journal

    I remember one time watching a shuttle launch on live TV where the abort was at 3 seconds till. It was a bit of a shocker to be that close.

    --
    People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.