Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Taming Liquid Hydrogen: The Centaur: Upper Stage Rocket, 1958-2002

Taming Liquid Hydrogen: The Centaur: Upper Stage Rocket, 1958-2002

Bowles, Mark D.
Dawson, Virginia P.

Paperback

Technology & EngineeringPhysics

ISBN10: 1478266538
ISBN13: 9781478266532
Publisher: Createspace
Published: Jul 18 2012
Pages: 306
Weight: 1.18
Height: 0.64 Width: 7.01 Depth: 10.00
Language: English
During its maiden voyage in May 1962, a Centaur upper stage rocket, mated to an At l a sb o o s t e r, exploded 54 seconds after launch, engulfing the rocket in a huge fireball. In ve s t i g a t i o nre vealed that Centaur's light, stainless-steel tank had split open, spilling its liquid-hyd rogen fueld own its sides, where the flame of the rocket exhaust immediately ignited it. Coming less thana year after President Kennedy had made landing human beings on the Moon a national p r i o r i t y, the loss of Centaur was regarded as a serious setback for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). During the failure investigation, Homer Newell, Di rector of Space Sciences, ruefully declared: Taming liquid hydrogen to the point where expensive oper-ational space missions can be committed to it has turned out to be more difficult than anyone supposed at the outset.

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