Air Force Sought to Calculate Where a Missile Might Fall After a Malfunction

A guided Red Tigress sounding rocket made a near 90-degree right turn within a second or two of clearing the launcher and flew stably in that direction until destroyed by the safety officer at 23.3 seconds.

Outcome

Destroyed by RSO at T+23.3 sec; pieces impacted two or three miles from launch pad.

Atlas 8E (flight 76): Missile stability lost at ~161 sec, ~30 sec after BECO, probably due to failure of the servo-amplifier power supply. Sustainer engine shut down at 248 sec; verniers ~10 sec later. Classified as Mode-5 response.

Outcome

Impact 1316 miles downrange and 215 miles crossrange.

Titan M-4: A one-bit error in the W velocity accumulation caused impact 86 miles short and 14 miles right of target.

Outcome

Off-target impact.

Atlas 145D (Mariner R-1): Booster phase normal until guidance enable at ~157 sec. Guidance rate beacon operation intermittent; faulty guidance equations gave erroneous commands. Vehicle deviations from 172 sec, max yaw deviation 60 deg and pitch deviation 28 deg at 270 sec; vehicle 'deviated grossly from the planned trajectory in azimuth and velocity, and executed abnormal maneuvers in pitch and yaw.'

Outcome

Destroyed by RSO at 293.5 sec, ~12 sec after SECO.

Atlas SLV-3 (GTA-9): Vehicle became unstable when B2 pitch control was lost at 121 sec. Loss of pitch control resulted in pitch-down maneuver greater than 90 deg. Guidance control lost at 132 sec; after BECO vehicle stabilized in an 'abnormal attitude.'

Outcome

Vehicle stabilized in abnormal attitude; SECO/VECO/Agena separation occurred normally from programmer commands.

Atlas 95F: Telemetered roll/yaw rates indicated erratic behavior immediately after liftoff. Yawed hard left in first 10 sec, then hard right, crossed flight line toward right destruct line, then pitched up violently with IP moving back toward beach.

Outcome

Destructed at ~45 sec at ~14,000 ft altitude; major pieces impacted less than a mile offshore.

Delta Intelsat III: Loss of rate gyro caused undamped pitch oscillations from 20 sec; 'a series of violent maneuvers' from 59 sec — vehicle pitched down ~270 deg, then up 210 deg, then large yaw left during a 13-sec interval. Regained control at 72 sec; first stage broke up at 103 sec; second stage destroyed by RSO at 110.6 sec.

Outcome

Major pieces impacted ~12 miles downrange and 2 miles left of flight line.

Delta Pioneer E: First-stage hydraulics system failed seconds before MECO. Vehicle pitched down, yawed left, rolled counterclockwise driving all gyros off limits, then tumbled. Second-stage separation/ignition occurred while out of control; second stage regained control after ~20 sec in yaw-right, pitch-up attitude.

Outcome

Flew stably ~240 sec in abnormal attitude until destroyed by safety officer at T+484 sec.

Atlas 68E: Lube oil pressure on B2 booster engine dropped at 102.7 sec. B2 shut down at 120.1 sec; B1 guidance shutdown 385 ms later. Asymmetric thrust caused yaw/roll the FCS could not correct; thrusting sustainer pivoted missile to a 'retrofire attitude' before stabilization. Sustainer continued thrusting in retrofire mode until 282.9 sec.

Outcome

Reentry heating caused sustainer shutdown and vehicle breakup at 282.9 sec.

Titan 34D (AFSC): At T+~8.8 sec the insulation and case of SRM No. 2 debonded resulting in case rupture. Core vehicle destroyed by fragments; Auto-destruct activated on SRM-1 at 9.0 sec.

Outcome

Vehicle destroyed shortly after liftoff.

Titan 34D (AFSC): Stage-1 engine experienced three major anomalies (S/A-2 oxidizer leak of 165 lb/sec at 110 sec, S/A-1 internal fuel leak of 30 lb/sec at 213 sec creating side force, S/A-1 turbopump shutdown at 213 sec). Erratic attitude rates noted at 221 sec; impact point stopped at 229 sec; stages separated as stage 2 ignited at 257 sec.

Outcome

Destruct sent by RSO at 273 sec.

Titan IV: Leak in SRM #1 at 99.9 sec rapidly enveloped vehicle in propellant gases; ~1.6 sec later vehicle blew up and disintegrated, apparently due to activation of inadvertent-separation destruct system. Destruct transmitted at 104.5 sec.

Outcome

Vehicle destroyed in flight.

Titan II/SLV (Landsat 6): After successful Titan-II second-stage burn and payload separation, the apogee-kick motor failed to ignite and circularize the highly-elliptical orbit.

Outcome

Landsat payload and Titan II followed ballistic trajectory back into atmosphere where burnup occurred.

Commercial Titan: Wiring team miswired the harness connecting the missile guidance computer payload-separation discretes to the payload separation device, so satellite never received separation signal. PKM and satellite did not separate from Stage II.

Outcome

Payload left in low-earth elliptical orbit; ground controllers separated satellite hours later but PKM remained attached to Stage II.

Thor 311 (Composite I): Probably due to rupture of lower oxidizer manifold, normal thrust levels never developed at second-stage ignition. About 50 ms after ignition, severe thrust chamber motion developed and second stage began to tumble. First tumble period ~29 sec. Classified as Mode-5.

Outcome

Propellant depletion at MECO+212 sec (nominal first burn was 378 sec).