Word: liquid-fuel
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...lately they're breaking up while heading toward their destinations. U.S. military men say sloppy Iraqi workmanship is at fault. The basic Soviet- built Scud-B has a 180-mile range, not enough to hit Israel or Saudi cities from Iraq. So the Iraqis have welded on liquid-fuel boosters to produce the Al Abbas (range: 540 miles) and the Al Hussein (390). But the welds have been so hastily done that the missiles have been literally falling apart under the stress of flight...
...Challenger tragedy, NASA spent $2.4 billion redesigning and replacing crucial components of its shuttle fleet. Over the past two years, the space agency has made more than 400 changes in the winged orbiter -- including a much touted new escape system -- the solid rocket boosters, the orbiter's three liquid-fuel engines and the huge external fuel tank. What is more, each of the modifications or changes was laboriously reviewed by the Discovery astronauts. "NASA went far beyond our recommendations and fixed all that we wanted," says Robert B. Hotz, a member of the Rogers commission. "There was a whole series...
...result of 38 degrees temperatures, which weakened an O ring, one of a pair of synthetic-rubber washers that keep hot gases from squirting through tiny gaps in the joint between sections of the solid-fuel rocket. When the O ring failed, escaping gas cut into the shuttle's liquid-fuel booster like a blowtorch and triggered a massive explosion. The modified design, said Thomas, will make a repeat catastrophe virtually impossible...
...rubber circles, .28 in. thick and 37.5 ft. in circumference, designed to make certain that the superhot gases generated within each solid booster could not escape through the joints of the rocket's segments. When flames did penetrate a rocket joint on Challenger, they ignited the shuttle's external liquid-fuel tank, causing the explosion. The commission will cite the O-ring history not only as the cause of the catastrophe but also as an exemplar of the agency's fatally faulty system...
...sleek three-stage Delta roared off its pad at 6:18 p.m. Saturday after a trouble-free countdown. Its main liquid-fuel engine and solid-fuel boosters all fired as planned. Delta soared into the clear Florida sky. Then, 71 seconds into its flight, monitoring technicians experienced a chilling case of deja vu. Their instruments showed that the main engine had shut down before it was programmed to do so, causing Delta to lose its flight stability. Veering out of control, the rocket began to break up. At 91 seconds, range safety officials destroyed it by remote control...