As with all accidents, a Board of Investigation was appointed. Six workers were injured, none seriously. I have two pages of an archive that explains the incident. It was a cascade of human errors and bad events.
In any test there was a Complex Coordinator who oversaw everything on the Test Stands. Various employees had this job. But the Complex guy was not a Certified Test Conductor. Get this-This was NOT a test firing. It was a pressurization test and a leak test for the fuel tanks. There had been a fire in two of the engines 3 days before. Leaks in the engine pre-valve had resulted in the fire.
A later check to isolate the leakage would have a catastrophic effect on the stage after the fire.
Here it is May 28, 1966 and a first-shift work crew DISCONNECTED the stage's tanks' pressure sensors and switches and left.
The 2nd shift arrived. They got to work trying to isolate the fuel leak. They started to pressurize the LH2 tank with Helium. The crew made 5 attempts to pressurize the tank but there was no pressure indication on the control panel. The pressure read 0 psig. The pressure in the tank continued to rise as there was no relief valve in operation. Twenty-six seconds after the pressure was applied for the 5th time the entire S-II-T exploded.I have very dramatic video of the aftermath.Only six NAA workers were injured very slightly.I do not know what happened to that 1st shift crew.They are probably running around Siberia somewhere.
Most of us at Boeing felt very badly for the Chrysler Crew.
They built the S-II-T and all of the 2nd stages. What a blow!
No comments:
Post a Comment