Space X is on the last stages of their unmanned Falcon 9 flight tests as part of NASA's Commercial Crew Program. Soon, it will be blowing up one of the rockets this Saturday (Jan 18) as part of the tests.
The intentional destruction of the rockets is meant to check if the accompanying spacecraft's capabilities to eject its astronauts in an emergency situation during launch automatically. The spacecraft is meant to jettison the astronauts it's carrying into space in case of any critical failure.
Space X Rockets: Testing For Safety
Space X's drill this Saturday is an extra step taken to ensure the safety of its passengers during launch. This comes after the failed attempt by Boeing last December to ferry astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS). What could have been a major milestone in aeronautics ended abruptly because of a glitch in the system, but luckily the astronauts were safely taken back to the surface with no one harmed.
Thus, Space X decided that they have to make sure that their Crew Dragon spacecraft is properly equipped for such emergency situations. They're not going to wait until their rockets really go haywire before confirming that their emergency evacuation protocols would work.
The in-flight abort test is scheduled for launch this Saturday at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The Crew Dragon spacecraft will try to separate from the rocket just two minutes after the launch. Space X will be triggering a launch escape during the simulation and see how well the Crew Dragon will be able to detach from the rocket.
While the spacecraft falls safely in the Atlantic Ocean and await for extraction, the rocket will continue its trajectory towards the ISS before it is intentionally blown up. Space X will also be responsible for the collection of the debris resulting from the explosion of the rocket.
Commercial Flights To Space
This Saturday's test is part of NASA's Commercial Crew Program, which is meant to ferry private crews to the ISS someday. In the long term, the Commercial Crew Program is also meant to pave the way for more efficient mass transportation of people into space.
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Aside from Space X, the commercial aviation company Boeing is also involved in the Commercial Crew Program. Together, Space X and Boeing are working towards NASA's vision of someday bringing people to Mars with affordability in mind.
The space program is almost done with all of its unmanned test flights, with the test flight this Saturday slated to be the last test flight for this phase. Moving forward, Space X will begin sending astronauts in their rockets with the International Space Station as their destination.
Space X CEO Elon Musk previously sent a tweet indicating that he wants the Crew Dragon to ferry astronauts to the ISS by 2020. NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley will be part of this possible crew.
If successful, Space X's efforts will allow astronauts to travel to the ISS from American soil once again, a practice that has since been abandoned in 2011 when the US ended NASA's Space Shuttle mission.
