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NASA's Rollercoaster For Moon Rocket Escape
simonbp writes "NASA's Constellation Project has approved the Rollercoaster Escape System to be used as the Emergency Egress Systems (EES) for astronauts and pad crew to race away from the Ares I pad, should an emergency be called. The Ares I is the first of NASA's new moon/Mars rockets and is scheduled for a first manned flight in 2014." From the article: "An unpowered fixed single-rail system from the access arm level of the ML tower to the existing bunker would be used. The railcars could be enclosed to provide personnel protection. Each railcar can hold four to six people. The rail would follow the ML tower vertically down to the pad surface, then turn and continue close to the ground to the safety bunker. A passive magnetic and friction braking system will decelerate the cars at the tracks end as well as prevent the cars from hitting each other."
I think some of the comments are missing a critical point here...
Not all emergencies requiring rapid pad evacuation necessarily involve just the crew in a capsule on a fueled booster ready to go. During the final count, the normal method of escape is going to be to fire the escape tower and pull the whole capsule off the booster.
However, before the crew is strapped in and the access arm is retracted there is the possibility of an emergency arising where they (and the closeout crew) need to leave in a hurry. In fact, that possibility is there days and days before launch for the the folks that work out on the pad. That's what this system is designed for.
I have been out on the shuttle pads when routine pre-flight work was being done, about 2 weeks before launch. Before I was given access to those areas, I had to be trained in escaping from the pad if an emergency like a fire or chemical leak arose (not a simple matter, the pad itself has hatches and a labyrinth of internal passages not unlike a ship). One part of that training was learning how to operate the slide wire baskets to rapidly get from the the access arm level to the ground. As I recall, you follow the big yellow arrows, get in facing backwards, pull the release handle, and pray.....
At that time the crew was about 1000 miles away from the pad, but the baskets were there to protect the pad workers in what is essentially a hazardous industrial area not unlike an oil refinery.
Worst...sig...ever!
I couldn't tell you if this system was developed before or after the Apollo 1 fire, but there was a launch tower escape system that consisted of a guy wire to the ground. In an emergency the crew would evac to a tower platform and into a harness, down the guy wire and into a block house. While not as sexy a high tech roller coaster, thanks to its simplicity probably more reliable. Why make things more complex than they need to be? I tried to find some information on the web but came up empty handed.
This system is not to be confused with the Launch Escape System that sat atop the capsule, which was a couple of small rockets intended to pull the capsule away from the main rocket assembly either on the pad or in flight if there was a catastrophic failure.
Not particularly. It's not unheard to fail to eject, or to have the ejector fire without being commanded to do so.
The FB-111 capsule escape system has been used (IIRC) 20-25 times across its history in US service - and one or both of the crew was severely injured each and every time. In the aviation community ejecting from an aircraft is reffered to as "attempting suicide to avoid being killed".