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Specialists are worried about Elon Musk’s groundbreaking SpaceX new tanks fueling and discharging systems (Load-And-Go), which may threaten the lives of astronauts and others even before launch. This comes as SpaceX is getting ready for its very first human spaceflight missions, scheduled for later this year.
The ‘Load-And-Go’ refueling technology
As the Washington Post reported, the SpaceX engineers the so-called ‘Load-And-Go’ technology as they were seeking new means of increasing the power of their propellants. The result proved to simply maintain the fuel at extremely low temperatures in order to reduce its volume in the tanks and increase their rockets’ tanks capacities.
But the extra low temperature, however, may indicate that refueling should be performed just prior to launch. By this time, the astronauts are already on board and every possible problem, or just a spark, in the meantime might provoke an explosion, threatening the crew’s lives.
On the other hand, SpaceX believes their abort system will permit astronauts to get away securely if anything wrong happens during the refueling procedure.
NASA accused SpaceX of negligence
NASA and several more connoisseurs are also especially troubled after the explosion of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in September 2016 when it was being fuelled. At that time there were no astronauts on board, but the situation might have been grimmer than a multimillion-dollar satellite loss, in case a crew was on the board of the spacecraft.
Following the NASA’s focus on SpaceX’s safety issues and after accusing them of putting crews lives in danger, some frictions have erupted between NASA and SpaceX, which, besides these recent contradictions, had a fruitful history.
Even more, NASA rejected the implementation of the SpaceX ‘Load-And-Go’ technology because the US space agency didn’t want to endanger the astronauts’ lives during future manned missions.
On the other hand, Benji Reed from SpaceX ensured everyone, including NASA, that the Elon Musk’s company is always interested in keeping their astronauts safe and ‘Load-And-Go’ technology is not as dangerous as NASA accused.
