Lars Osborne (@lars_0)
7/15/19, 12:51 PM
I work with hypergolic propellants now. I feel pretty satisfied with this
explanation and think it has lessons for the industry.
What is missing is that the destruction of the check valve exposed bare Ti and
accelerated the metal chips into the MON tank at high velocity.
pic.twitter.com/09ud6OZFMv
Lars posted this a bit ago as the SpaceX failure analysis went public.
Basically, slug of NTO migrated upstream past a He check valve, pushed back
downstream on subsequent pressurization to fracture the check valve and throw
Titanium metal fragments into the NTO tank...
Fix is replacing with burst discs.
-george
Sent from my iPhone
