NASA Successfully Tests Orion's New Crew Escape System

Boccaccio writes "NASA on Wednesday successfully tested its MLAS alternative launch escape system designed for the new Orion Crew module. MLAS, or Max Launch Abort System, is named after the inventor of the crew escape system on the Mercury program, Maxime (Max) Faget and consists of four rocket motors built into a fairing that encloses an Orion module during Launch. MLAS is designed to pull the crew away from the main rocket stack during the critical first 2.5 minutes of flight in the event of a catastrophic failure. The advantage of the MLAS system over the more traditional LAS (Launch Abort System) is that it reduces the total height of the rocket, lowering the center of gravity and adding stability, and potentially allowing higher fuel load. You can watch a video of the launch at the NASA website, and there are also a bunch of pictures."

Comments

Its an alternate solution.

[Hozza]

The summary doesn't really make this clear, but the baseline Orion design uses a standard LAS system.

The MLAS is only being developed as a possible alternate, if the LAS solution proves unworkable.

Re:backup of a backup.

[teridon]

However when looking at the video there is the posibilty they get other elements of the escape capsule on their head after a succesful landing.

I know this is /., but try RTFA:

Because the MLAS flight test vehicle was not optimized for weight and parachute performance, there may be recontact between the elements of the test vehicle after the parachutes are fully deployed and after all the required data is collected. If recontact does occur it will not affect the MLAS test objectives, nor will it apply to Orion -- as the MLAS design and hardware are not representative of the current Orion design.