Rocket launch failure, crew survives

So the Russian launch of a Soyuz capsule with crew, bound for the International Space Station, suffered a booster failure in flight. And the crew lived and rejoined their families back at the launch site the same day.

I thought this survival was unprecedented, but it appears to be at least the third such incident in Soyuz and human space flight history. Crews survived prior launch failures in 1975 and 1983. The current Soyuz version went into service in 2001.

In 1975, a second and third stage didn't separate properly. The third stage engine did blow the second stage off, but it was no longer able to reach the intended orbit so an automatic abort was triggered. The crew experienced 21 g's during reentry, but lived. One crew member flew again, while the other was permanently grounded by internal injuries.

In 1983, a valve failure spilled fuel on the pad moments before intended launch, causing a huge fire. The rocket was actually starting to sway from the fire's structural damage, and the escape rockets were needed to yank the crew capsule up and away from the inferno. The primary wiring path to activate that escape system was already wrecked by the fire, and the backup path didn't get triggered until just 2-4 seconds before the rocket toppled. But it worked, they survived.

I can't think of any significant U.S. launch failures ending in crew survival. Space Shuttle Challenger was destroyed by a launch failure. Columbia's break up occurred during reentry, but was caused by damage during launch, so one can quibble about whether it was a launch or a return problem. Both crews were lost. (The Soviets did suffer several cases of return fatalities. Our Apollo 1 burned during testing, not during flight.)

(We have experienced lesser failures where a single engine shut down prematurely, late in boost phase, both on Apollo and on the Space Shuttle. But the fuel remained available to the other engines, which burned longer to compensate, and the full missions still succeeded.)

I must applaud the folks who made today's crew safety systems work. This is a highly significant day in space flight, but it was mostly buried by much bigger unrelated headlines.

A Russian Soyuz Rocket Launch Failed, But Its Abort Safety System Saved Lives

Had a crew launched on that doomed Soyuz last week, would they have died? | Ars Technica

‘We Were Swearing!’ Thirty Years Since Russia’s Brush With Disaster « AmericaSpace