Re: Soyuz malfunction during launch
Posted: Sun Oct 14, 2018 8:58 pm
Are there any other examples of a seal between two components which is not sealed at all until pressure forces it into place ? The STS booster segments were only connected mechanically and not gas-tight, until the fuel ignited, and not immediately even then, as puffs of black smoke emerging from the joints had been recorded on previous missions. En passant, the first ESRO spacecraft launch in 1967/8 was a failure. It transpired afterwards that NASA had dropped the assembled launch vehicle, cracking the solid propellant and enabling combustion to burn down the fault line and out through the side of the vehicle. The thrust at 90° created an interesting Catherine wheel effect until the vehicle came apart. They admitted the mistake and donated a free launch to ESRO for the backup, ESRO-II.