NASA reports rocket explosion on Wallops Island

By William Atkins
Friday, 22 August 2008 18:48

Science - Space

A 53-foot rocket carrying two NASA experiments exploded 27 seconds after lift off on Friday morning, August 22, 2008, at its rocket launch site located on its Wallops Island Facility at the Eastern Shore of Virginia.


NASA announced that only seconds after liftoff--which occurred at 5:10 a.m. EDT (0910 GMT)--at the LP-0B launch site of the MId-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (Wallops Island Facility) an "unknown anomaly" occurred within the rocket.

NASA range safety officers were forced at 5:37 a.m. EDT (0937 GMT), twenty-seven seconds after liftoff, to destroy the rocket.

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center runs the Wallops Island Facility as a launch site for science and exploration missions for NASA and other federal agencies.

The sub-orbital ATK Launch Vehicle X-1 (ALV X-1) is a sounding rocket developed by Alliant Techsystems.

NASA reports that there were no injuries or property damage from the incident. Most of the debris fell into the Atlantic ocean, however, some was reported to have fallen on land. Officials at NASA caution the public that the debris could be hazardous.

The Virginian-Pilot article “Rocket explodes shortly after launch at Wallops Island,” stated, “[NASA] officials said the debris could be hazardous and warned residents not to touch it…. Anyone who discovers debris was being asked to call the Wallops Emergency Operations Center at (757) 824-1300.” [Virginian-Pilot newspaper in Hampton Roads, Virginia]

According to the NASA media advisory, “NASA is very disappointed in this failure but has directed its focus on protecting public safety and conducting a comprehensive investigation to identify the root cause. NASA is assembling a multidiscipline team, along with the rocket's maker Alliant Tech Systems, or ATK, of Salt Lake City, to begin the investigation promptly.”

The rocket carried two primary experiments. Please read on for additional information.