The Crew Dragon Pad Abort Test (officially known as the SpaceX Pad Abort Test) was a spacecraft test conducted by

SpaceX Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) is an American spacecraft manufacturer, launcher, and a satellite communications corporation headquartered in Hawthorne, California. It was founded in 2002 by Elon Musk with the stated goal of ...

on 6 May 2015 from the

Space Launch Complex 40 Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40), previously Launch Complex 40 (LC-40) is a launch pad for rockets located at the north end of Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida. The launch pad was used by the United States Air Force for 55 Titan III a ...

(SLC-40) at

Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS) is an installation of the United States Space Force's Space Launch Delta 45, located on Cape Canaveral in Brevard County, Florida. Headquartered at the nearby Patrick Space Force Base, the statio ...

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

. As part of the

development Development or developing may refer to: Arts *Development hell, when a project is stuck in development *Filmmaking, development phase, including finance and budgeting *Development (music), the process thematic material is reshaped * Photograph ...

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...

Commercial Crew Program The Commercial Crew Program (CCP) provides commercially-operated crew transportation service to and from the International Space Station (ISS) under contract to NASA, conducting crew rotations between the expeditions of the International Sp ...

, the test demonstrated the spacecraft's abort system capability, verifying the capsule's eight side-mounted SuperDraco thrusters' capability to quickly power itself away from a failing rocket while it is still on the ground. It was one of the two tests conducted by SpaceX on the abort system of spacecraft, the other one being the

Crew Dragon In-Flight Abort Test SpaceX Crew Dragon In-Flight Abort Test (also known as Crew Dragon Launch Escape Demonstration) was a successful test of the SpaceX Dragon 2 abort system, conducted on 19 January 2020. It was the final assessment for the Crew Dragon and Falcon ...

conducted on 19 January 2020.

History

The flight was the one of four tests for the

(CCiCap) award given to SpaceX in 2012. The capsule had 270 sensors as well as a dummy and had weights to simulate a crewed launch. The vehicle lifted off at 13:00 UTC on 6 May 2015. After reaching a maximum height of about , slightly lower than expected; Dragon jettisoned its trunk about 21 seconds after the liftoff. The Dragon then deployed both the drogue and three main parachutes as expected. The vehicle splashed down safely in the ocean to the east of the launchpad in the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

99 seconds after the liftoff about 8 seconds earlier then planned. The landing site was expected to be about away from the launchpad but landed closer to shore then expected. The slight underperformances were linked to a fuel mixture ratio issue was detected after the flight in one of the eight SuperDraco engines, but did not materially affect the flight. Crew Dragon Pad Abort Test (17436749351)

Crew Dragon Pad Abort Test (17436749351)

The C201 capsule, dubbed ''

DragonFly A dragonfly is a flying insect belonging to the infraorder Anisoptera below the order Odonata. About 3,000 extant species of true dragonfly are known. Most are tropical, with fewer species in temperate regions. Loss of wetland habitat threate ...

'' was originally planned to be used for the in-flight abort test expected to fly after this mission. However, SpaceX and NASA decided later to use the capsule used for Demo-1 for the in-flight abort test as there were design changes after construction of ''DragonFly''. However, as that capsule was destroyed SpaceX used the one planned to be used for

Demo-2 Crew Dragon Demo-2 (officially Crew Demo-2, SpaceX Demo-2, or Demonstration Mission-2) was the first crewed test flight of the Crew Dragon spacecraft. The spacecraft, named '' Endeavour'', launched on 30 May 2020 on a Falcon 9 booster, and carr ...

References

{{SpaceX Test spaceflights SpaceX Dragon 2 2015 in spaceflight May 2015 events in the United States

History

See also

References