Space Rescue and Safety

Space Rescue and Safety

Edited by Philip H. Bolger. 272 pages, hardcover, $20.00. American Astronautical Society (1975)

Potential space rescuers have been forced to watch helplessly as space crews perished or limped home from beyond the reach of direct Earth aid. A recent congress of the International Astronautical Federation was the setting for a special meeting of concerned would-be rescuers who discussed the difficult problems of space rescue in the age of the Space Shuttle. Someday the lives of endangered astronauts or cosmonauts may be saved by outside help, as in the science fiction movie “Marooned”. So far, however, it’s all talk – and this book reports on it all.

This collection of articles represents an enormous spectrum of interests. One gets the first impression that the meeting organizer really had to stretch the scope of the subsession in order to get enough papers submitted. They include engineering proposals, operational constraints, statistical summaries, historical analysis, bibliographical and related subject guides, and reports on present and planned systems.

Cosmos. Illustration by Elena

Two papers dal with emergency one-man “bailout” from orbit. A stranded spaceman must return to Earth without a spacecraft which has become disabled. Inflatable heat shield are proposed, while one engineer suggests a revolutionary (but entirely feasible) heat resistant parachute for return from orbit without any ablative heat shield at all.\Other authors discuss ways to prevent spacecraft failure: reliability, testing, and preflight verification. An interesting survey of spacecraft and engine structural failures (so far, all on the ground) sheds new light on engineering and management techniques which have made the United States space program so successful.

Another excellent section deals with rescue capabilities of the Space Shuttle, including crew training, spacesuits and airlocks. Passengers may be evacuated in pressurized “rescue pods” carried by space-suited astronauts or by the amazing mechanical arm which will be installed on the Shuttle. A “manned maneuvring unit” can provide mobility and carrying power during rescue. All these excellent plans, however, call for the availability of a second Space Shuttle to come to the aid of the disables sister ship. But the first production space plane may fly solo for more than 1- 1/2 years before the next one is ready for flight. Hence, no rescue option will be available during this interval.

But astronomers have lived with that risk, and have survived before. A historical in-depth analysis of the Skylab reliability and rescue programs gives perspective to the problem and reveals why the danger of a “solo” Space Shuttle is very low after all.

Two studies discuss the probability of collision of two orbiting satellites (low, but becoming significant as flights are longer, ships are bigger, and more junk is left in space) and the probability that a downed space crew at sea might be able to depend on world fishing fleets for emergency pickup. Both topics are interesting and important, though too long and somewhat tedious.

The overall level of these papers reflects the general survey nature of the conference; there is just not much deep technical information available. By the end of the book, though, what appeared to be a hodgepodge of disparate topics seems to merge into one “big picture” of space rescue, testifying to the real care with which the session was organized. Space rescue and safety is truly a multifaceted problem.

The result is a fascinating, wide-ranging and easy to read survey of a “life or death” subject.

No American astronaut has ever died in space, and none have died on duty in nearly a decade. The technology and plans described in this book will hopefully continue to trend for many years to come

James E. Oberg (August 1976)