AAE 450 Spring 2008 Stephen Bluestone February 28, 2008 Propulsion Group Historic Solid Rocket Failure Probability

Historical Failure Probability  U.S. Solid Rocket Systems (Failures/Attempts) –6 / 412 (1.4%) Failures between –19 / 3382 (0.56%) Failures between  Solid Propulsion Failure Rates (Failures/Attempts) –Upper Stage /10000 –Monolithic /10000 –Segmented /10000 –Total /10000 AAE 450 Spring 2008 Propulsion – Propellants

Catastrophic Failure  Historically Solid Rocket failure results in catastrophic failure 37% of the time (19 solid failures, 7 were catastrophic) [ ] 1  Solid Rocket Failure Rate (Failures/Attempts) –Failure , 56/10000 –Catastrophic Failure ,21/10000  Working with Prop and whole team to finalize all designs and prop systems AAE 450 Spring 2008 Propulsion - Propellants Future Work

References 1.Chang, I-Shih., Tomei, Edmardo Joe., “Solid Rocket Failures in World Space Launches.” AIAA Paper , Joint Propulsion Conference and Exhibit, 41st, Tuscon, Az, July 10-13, Sauvageu, Donald R., Allen, Brian D., “Launch Vehicle Historical Reliability.” AIAA AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference and Exhibit, 34th, Cleveland, OH, July 13-15, 1998 AAE 450 Spring 2008

 Reference 2 is based off a study of the following U.S. solid rocket launch systems included –Taurus –Conestoga –Athena –Minotaur –Pegasus –Scout