Musk's Starship's first launch failed, with the rocket exploding and disintegrating mid-air, attracting global media attention. However, prior to this incident, another US heavy rocket, which had high hopes, experienced a massive explosion during testing, destroying the entire facility, and hardly received any attention. Some say this news was concealed, possibly due to its military purpose.
The explosion occurred on March 29 at NASA's Space Flight Center in Alabama. The upper stage of the Vulcan Centaur rocket, which was undergoing testing on the test platform, suddenly exploded. A huge fireball engulfed the entire testing facility, causing a shocking sight.
The Vulcan Centaur is a new heavy-lift rocket developed by United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin, aimed at replacing the Atlas V and Delta IV Heavy rockets. It is designed to meet the launch requirements of the US government's National Security Space Launch (NSSL) program, serving the US Space Force and US intelligence agencies for national security satellite launches. This demonstrates the importance of this rocket.
Vulcan began development in 2014 and consists of the Vulcan Centaur and upper stage Centaur rocket. The Vulcan Centaur has a 5.4-meter diameter booster, and like Musk's Starship, it uses methane and liquid oxygen as fuel. However, it is powered by two BE-4 engines provided by Blue Origin, a company owned by Musk's rival, Amazon's Jeff Bezos. Additionally, up to six GEM-63XL solid rocket boosters can be attached depending on the mission requirements.
The Vulcan Centaur can deliver a payload of up to 27.2 tons to low Earth orbit, 15.3 tons to geostationary transfer orbit, 7 tons to geostationary orbit, and 12.3 tons to lunar transfer orbit, which is similar to Musk's Falcon 9.
The explosion involved the Centaur upper stage rocket, which is the world's first rocket stage to use a combination of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen as fuel. According to the company's CEO, Tory Bruno, the explosion occurred during a pressurization test, possibly due to a large accumulation of leaked hydrogen gas, which met a spark and suddenly exploded, destroying the testing facility.
Vulcan was originally scheduled for its first launch on May 4, but now it seems the timeline may be pushed back again. Meanwhile, Virgin Orbit's rocket launch failure this year has caused financial difficulties for the company, which has filed for bankruptcy protection. ABL's RS1 rocket crashed, and the Terran 1 from Relativity Space failed to deliver its payload into orbit and was abandoned. Why have there been so many rocket explosions and failures in the US this year?
This should actually be considered a "sweet sorrow" because all these rockets are still under development, not mature rockets. So far this year, no mature rockets have experienced launch failures.
This means that the US commercial space sector is booming, with more and more companies entering the field and developing new technologies, such as Starship's methane and liquid oxygen full-flow staged combustion engine, the first practical engine of its kind. Rapid iterations, high-frequency testing, and the use of new technologies inevitably lead to uncertainties and risks in rocket testing, and accidents are bound to happen.
Therefore, explosions are not terrible; the absence of explosions is truly frightening, as it signifies stagnation in technology and the depletion of innovation. Lying in bed and relying on past achievements is undoubtedly safe, but in the end, it will lead to elimination.