Safety
Rockets have a reputation for unreliability and danger; especially catastrophic failures. Contrary to this reputation, carefully designed rockets can be made arbitrarily reliable. In military use, rockets are not unreliable. However, one of the main non-military uses of rockets is for orbital launch. In this application, the premium has typically been placed on minimum weight, and it is difficult to achieve high reliability and low weight simultaneously. In addition, if the number of flights launched is low, there is a very high chance of a design, operations or manufacturing error causing destruction of the vehicle. Essentially all launch vehicles are test vehicles by normal aerospace standards (as of 2006).
The X-15 rocket plane achieved a 0.5% failure rate, with a single catastrophic failure during ground test, and the SSME has managed to avoid catastrophic failures in over 350 engine-flights.
Read more about this topic: Rocket Engine
Famous quotes containing the word safety:
“Man gives every reason for his conduct save one, every excuse for his crimes save one, every plea for his safety save one; and that one is his cowardice.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)
“There is always safety in valor.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The high sentiments always win in the end, the leaders who offer blood, toil, tears and sweat always get more out of their followers than those who offer safety and a good time. When it comes to the pinch, human beings are heroic.”
—George Orwell (1903–1950)