*From:* "Greg D. Moore \(Strider\)"
*Date:* Wed, 17 Dec 2008 16:59:24 -0500

wrote in message
...

With the shuttle, loss of the mission also almost always means
loss of the
crew. At least Ares has a launch escape system worthy of the name.

Is it?

There's at least one scenario as I recall where if the SRB
detonates, the escape system ain't worth it's weight in gold.

What's that? Can the SRB actually explode rather than just develop a leak
followed by a wild course divergence?


And note, the next most flown manned system has used its launch
escape system, but its two fatal flights (which match the Shuttle's
record) occurred well after it would have been useful. And the
most recent ballistic landings are not a good sign for Soyuz either.

The one fatal Apollo accident couldn't be prevented by the launch escape
system either, but surely a simple capsule can be in principle a lot safer
than the immensely complex shuttle.



The fact is, all manned launch vehicles are very low down on the
learning due to low launch rates. That means we're only making
guesses (granted, some of them more educated than others), but they
are still guesses.

That's all you can do at the end of it. However Ares I does tend to be
much more at the KISS end of the spectrum. OK, there is less redundancy
but that means there's less to go wrong too.



And Ares I seems to have taken the worst components from STS and
used those.

The SRBs have worked 199 times out of 200. IMO the escape system takes
away a good portion of the risk of sitting on top of a rocket that can't
be shut down once started, although obviously the escape system has to
work...