NASA and SpaceX are still investigating the accident following its destruction more than a month ago, according to Space News. Elon Musk’s team said an “anomaly occurred” during the test of its propulsion system. Leaked footage of the explosion showed the spacecraft, which was to be used by astronauts, engulfed in flames
The NASA Advisory Council’s human exploration and operations committee is determining the cause of the accident and its implication for upcoming test flights.
Kathy Lueders, manager of the commercial crew program at NASA, said: “An anomaly occurred during activation of the SuperDraco system.
“The team followed the mishap plan beautifully. All the notifications were made. The SpaceX folks did a tremendous job.”
Ms Lueders went to say the accident was something of a “gift” to the program, Space News reported.
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She said: “We’re learning a lot. Sometimes you learn more from a failure like this.
“It’s pretty sad not to have that vehicle.
“I was hoping that vehicle would be in a museum one day. But, I think this is a vehicle that continues to serve her purpose to make human spaceflight safer and safer.
“We will learn from this test, and that learning will be applied to the next vehicle.”
The destroyed capsule had previously flew to the International Space Station on the Demo-1 test flight.
SpaceX planned on using the same capsule for the abort test this summer.
But SpaceX will use Crew-1 which it built for its first operational mission.
Dates for the test flight are currently under the review.
