Volume 9, Number 1 • January/February 2001

“Lifeboat” Lands Safely

The world’s largest parafoil carried an advanced X-38 test craft to a touchdown on November 2, 2000 at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards, California.

This was the first flight test of the final configuration of the X-38 atmospheric test vehicle that included a rounded aft end, identical to the shape of the X-38 spaceflight vehicle now under construction at NASA Johnson Space Center, Houston, Texas. A space test of an uncrewed X-38 is planned for August 2002 when it will be released from a Space Shuttle to fly back to Earth.

Released from under the wing of NASA’s B-52 aircraft at an altitude of 36,500 feet, the X-38 had a flight control problem that resulted in a 360-degree roll following the drop from the B-52. As scheduled, at 24 seconds into the flight the X-38’s 80-foot diameter drogue parachute was deployed and the vehicle recovered from the roll.

The X-38 vehicle 131R demonstrates a huge 7,500 square-foot parafoil that will enable the Crew Return Vehicle (CRV) to land on the length of a football field after returning from space. The CRV is intended to serve as an emergency transport to carry a crew to safety in the event of problems with the International Space Station. Photo provided by NASA Dryden Flight Research Center.

The flight test also featured a 7,500-square-foot parafoil with a surface area more than one-and-a-half times that of the wings of a 747 jumbo jet. A second problem occurred at 19,000 feet when the parafoil began its deployment while the X-38 was in a nose up attitude. However, the parafoil deployed without damage and flew to a safe touchdown less than half a mile from the original target. Touchdown speed was less than 40 miles an hour. "Today our design faced a test. Most systems worked well, some didn’t," said X-38 program manager John Muratore. "We’re going to take the results of this test, improve the design, and we will be back to test it again. That’s the nature of flight testing," he added.

The X-38 is a prototype "lifeboat" for the International Space Station, designed to carry up to seven passengers home from orbit in an emergency. The project combines proven technologies–a shape borrowed from a 1970s Air Force lifting body project–with some of the most cutting-edge aerospace technology available today, such as the most powerful electric motors ever used to control a spacecraft.

An innovative approach is enabling the X-38 to be developed at a tenth of the cost of past estimates for such a project. Although the United States leads the development of the X-38, international space agencies also are participating. Contributing nations include Germany, Belgium, Italy, the Netherlands, France, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.

For more information, contact Leslie Williams at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center (661/276-3893) leslie.williams@dfrc.nasa.gov. Please mention you read about it in Innovation.