RP-1 Realism Overhaul Mission Report: International Air and Space Organisation

[Evebaek]

On January 1 1951 the International Air and Space Organization (IASO) is formed as an of branch of the United Nations as an effort for Cooperation between nations and new frontiers begin to form.

February 16 1951 the newly formed organization begins flight operations to explore supersonic flight regimes with a modified USAF experimental jet plane called the B-001. The modified aircraft first flight was to attempt to climb to 15km (49000ft) and perform a dive at around 30 degrees to attempt to break the speed of sound an maintain that speed for 30 seconds.

The pilot for this flight is Alexis Hall. the take off went well outside of minor control problems when on the runway and Alexis ascended to the required height after a few minutes. Then Alexis performed the dive and successfully completed the missions goals.

However on approach a bit short of the runway the aircraft began to stall and landed around 100m before the runway and the tail engine and its primary control surfaces were destroyed but luckily Alexis and the rest of the aircraft were undamaged and the mission is complete. The possibility of the aircraft's repair is possible however it is determined that there would be no use for it in future missions so it will likely remain in a hangar until it is scraped.

[Evebaek]

April 3 1951 the IASO performed their first launch of a sounding rocket called the "Hornet".

The Hornet is powered by a Soviet U-1250 on its second and third stage and a Tiny Tim missile as it's first stage.

The first stage is referred to as "H-0", the second stage as "H-1" and the third and final stage as "H-2".

During its first launch all systems flew flawlessly and the small yet powerful sounding rocket was able to breach the karmen line and reach space officially starting the organizations space division

The sounding rocket was successfully recovered a few kilometers away from the launch site after its nose cone was jettisoned to provide a better surface for deceleration.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

After the launch of the first Hornet rocket the organization performed an additional launch purely for research of the upper atmosphere and low space and the rocket reached an altitude above 200km (124 miles)

_______________________________________________________________________

Around a month later the organization completed construction of their first Jupiter Missile, it's main engine is a RD-101 with avionics produced in the USA and structure built in Europe.

The goal of this flight was to meet altitude requirements of 130km (80 miles) with 500kg of payload.

The missile performed its flight successfully and the missile was terminated at 80km on decent to prevent damage to facilities near by.

Edited January 2 by Evebaek

[Evebaek]

The start of 1952 did not go well the the International Air and Space Organization as it had two mission failures that ended up slowing flights for a period.

The first mission to fail is when the organization attempted to fly a biological sample of flies, earth worms and beetles past 100km in recovery mission to study the affects of the space environment on small life forms before larger animals were flown. However after the Tiny Tim stage and the H-1 stage burned out the H-2 stage main engine failed to ignite due to some of the propellant getting stuck in the flow lines.

The rocket ascended above 20km before falling and being recovered, however the process was extended due to the rocket still having propellants inside. In further missions an inflight abort will be triggered if this happens again even for rockets this small.

The second launch of 1952 was of a Jupiter 1 trying to perform a altitude sounding rocket contract by United States and Europe to research how water reacts wit the upper atmosphere and space by having the rocket fly up to 130km (80 miles) and have explosives release 400 liters of water into the atmosphere and having aircraft  flying near by to examine the water as it hopefully falls.

This was also the first night launch of the organization. shortly after launch at around 12km (39000ft) the RD-101 engine shut down leaving the rocket to ascend to 16km (52000ft) before being terminated by range safety resulting in a large explosion in the air caused by most of the rocket propellant igniting.

Due to the two failures the organization decided that the organization is to have a definitive leader do Valentin Glushko was selected as the organizations head and Ilyushin Design Bureau was chosen as a sub-contractor

[Evebaek]

After ironing out the issues from the previous Jupiter and Hornet launches the organization performed a reattempt of sending a biological payload past 100km along with observational equipment. The launch happened early in the morning and successfully reached and surpassed the desired altitude providing the program with additional data for how life forms react to high altitudes and space.

A little over a month later the Jupiter missile was prepped for launch in an upgraded B variant that had lighter tanks and more propellant and some new livery on the engine shroud, because of the higher amounts of propellant the launch site was moved further away from launch teams and engineering sites to a brand new launch pad. the launch intended to perform a different mission than the previously failed Jupiter launch, now instead of having the missile destroyed. It will be left to fall back down onto the ground to test how different materials on the nose cone and fin aerodynamic properties will affect high speed objects falling from space, which is a needed thing to know for crewed space flight.

The launch went well ascending to over 200km without having any major faults on launch, the only issue was minor instability in max-Q and after engine burnout.

On decent the missile began to experience some heating from the speed at which it entered but this did not affect the missile. However the materials experiment on the nose cone because of the fins on the missile breaking of and the missile going into a stable -1.9 to 2.3 degree pitch with the missile keeping a stable heading and falling flat. although these naturally stable aerodynamic elements could potentially be used in the future for reentry craft or mars landers.

[Evebaek]

After those two successful flights the IASO gave the go ahead for development for an aircraft that is built to fly at supersonic speeds and reach altitudes never achieved by people before. This new Accelerator program is planned to have its first launch later in the year.

In September 1952 the organization had a second launch of a Hornet sounding rocket containing a biological payload of large beetles, worms and and egg. the launch went of successfully and the payload and the rocket were recovered a few kilometers from the launch site.

A month later a second flight of  the upgraded Jupiter missile was performed to reattempt the American, European in space water experiment where the rocket was supposed to release high pressure water above the karmen line. The initial start of the launch went off well but around a minute into flight the main engine suffered a catastrophic failure and exploded resulting in a loss of thrust and mission failure. The missile was terminated at its apoapsis of 67km but with the water still released earlier to try and gain as much as possible from this failure.

_________________________________________________________________________

Mid October 1952 the Accelerator program conducts its first flight of an experimental air craft called Ac-001b. It is powered by 1 XLR11 engine which as a first contains multiple restarts and minor throttling by turning off individual chambers. Its design is a collaboration by the United States and Canada. The goal of this flight is to reach and altitude of 20km and a speed of 420m/s.

The test flight was flown by Alexis Hall (the first person to reach mach 1 and sustain it in flight) and successfully met and surpassed expectations of speed and altitude. The aircraft landed on the newly constructed runway north of the centers first runway is is being refurbished for its next flight.

[Evebaek]

November 11 1952 the Hornet Sounding rocket performs it's last contracted biological launch and brought 75kg of water born organisms and a pressurized container of some arachnids. The organization is not certain if Hornet will be retired permanently because it could be used for later low space scientific experiments.

Currently keeping with the success of the past launches and flights the last rocket launch of the year on December 12 will be a Jupiter 1B missile launching up to 180km. This is the third attempt of a in space water materials experiment.

And to close of the year the Ac-001B performed a second flight on the 19th trying to get to an altitude of 25km. Alexis successfully piloted the aircraft to the needed altitude and landed on the runway with a few bumps. Additionally Alexis performed experiments on a persons reaction to higher than mach 2 speeds and visual assessments of the ground and the large canal stretching through Australia.

[Evebaek]

The organization and its programs had a fairly long pause for most of 1953 as development of a greatly modified Jupiter missile started and the Accelerator program had to wait for more technology to develop. This temporary hiatus from flights and launches ended on September 4 when the Jupiter 1C missile was rolled out to its launch pad to attempt a one of a kind mission to launch film into space and return it for viewing.

The launch went of well with the missile pitching over 45 degrees over a minute and a half to get the missile on its trajectory to meet downrange requirements. after engine burnout the payload fairings designed to reduce drag and aerodynamic stress on the payload deployed exposing the film camera to space and take several pictures over its time in space. when the film capsule and its recovery equipment reentered the atmosphere the capsule was also to naturally orientate it's self with the parachute facing up and a flat face down. At 5000m the parachutes deployed and the capsule was recovered 829km downrange and reaching a maximum altitude over 200km.

After recovery the images taken were processed and the first images from space were revealed to the public.

[Evebaek]

Even though 1953 was a dry year for the program it did feature many new technological advancements such as being able to film in space and recover the film. Although an advancement that will effect everyday people is the development of jet engines that are capable of sustaining supersonic speeds when level. This was tested using the  B-002c experimental jet with 2 J57 jet engines and the flights goal was to maintain speeds above 420m/s for 5 minutes while being level.

The aircraft was successfully able to perform it's mission however due to unknown reasons it under-performed and only barely met the desired goals, however the aircraft did show a lot of capability for maneuvering so these aircraft can be repurposed from experimental aircraft to trainers or chase aircraft for Accelerator vehicles. the organization has accepted and started production of an alternate idea that did not meet the cut for the first aircraft.

The only major issue with this aircraft is that when yawing and pitching at the same time the aircraft tends to stall which was greatly observed in the test flight, as upon returning to the runway the aircraft stalled at 13km and descended uncontrolled to 5km before being recovered and landing.

 

Mid February 1954 the second launch of a Jupiter 1F was not successful due to a performance loss on the RD-102 engine which lead to the missile only reaching 70km in altitude and 200km downrange.

Even though this launch failed some images were still able to be gathered and to be studied. A replacement missile has been ordered for a reattempt planned for mid 1954.

[Evebaek]

End of March 1954 an aircraft that competed with the B-002C for supersonic flights the "B-003c" performs its first flight by trusted pilot Alexis Hall. the goal of this mission was to perform the same contract that was attempted earlier in the year. this aircraft is a cooperation between the United States and the United Kingdom with the engines and the control systems coming from the USA and the rest of the aircraft from the UK.

The aircraft flew in the early morning (which has become a weird standard in the organization) and slowly ascended to 13km (8 miles) and leveled out and began to try and reached the wanted speed of 525m/s (1722feet/s). The B-003c successfully met the wanted speed and in fact showed its capability to surpass those speeds and reach 600m/s (1968feet/s) while stressing the engines to the maximum. the aircraft touched down a little under an hour later with a slightly bumpy landing but with a very successful mission.

 

The organization performed back to back Accelerator flights with the goal of reaching 40km (24 miles) with no speed requirements. The Ac-001 attempted to perform this mission however at higher altitudes the aircraft was unable to maintain pitch and Alexis's equipment for keeping atmosphere in the cockpit was unable to unction past 30km (18 miles) so the mission was not able to be completed due to those reasons.

a few weeks later the Ac-001 was modified to the Ac-002 with an upgraded engine and tanks but most importantly an upgraded cockpit allowing altitudes estimated to 75km (46 miles). the Ac-002 was dropped by its carrier airplane 320km (198 miles) away from the runway and began it's accent, the aircraft was able to break speed and altitude milestones like getting faster than 1200m/s (3937feet/s) and getting to 38km (23 miles) but the upgraded aircraft stiff suffered from the same problem as the Ac-001 with pitch control so the mission was a partial failure but the organizations scientists still learn a lot about supersonic flight regimes.

 

On the bright side July had the Jupiter return to flight with another film canister launch to 120km (74 miles) altitude and 400km (248miles) downrange. The launch was performed in the mid afternoon and went off flawlessly, the capsule was able to meet the correct speeds and altitudes estimated for the mission. the capsule separated from the missile at 70km and got to an altitude of 220km (136 miles) and a downrange distance of 800km (500 miles) and was recovered successfully in the desert.

[Evebaek]

September 3 1954 the B-003c performs a supersonic experimental flight to reach 600m/s and maintain that speed. Alexis completed this contract successfully and landed on the space centers runway.

Shortly after the B-002b attempts a recertification flight however this test failed and the aircraft performed the same. the cause of this under performance is predicted to be because of the air intakes producing too much drag resulting in the aircraft being unable to meet the wanted speeds

 

The end of October had the debut of new x-plane which is the third iteration of the Accelerator supersonic planes. this flight had the aircraft reach 61km (37 miles) and a maximum speed of around 1500m/s (4920 feet/s), although Alexis did scare flight teams by nearly running of the runway when landing.

November 28 the B-002c which is a version of the B-002b with different air intakes reattempts its certification flight and successfully meats the wanted speeds and is still able to maintain its maneuverability at speeds above mach 1.

6 days later the Jupiter 1F launches for the last time carrying a film canister trying to recover it 800km (497 miles) downrange and 200km (124 miles) altitude and is recovered successfully on the ground

The Ac-003 flew again reaching speeds of 1145m/s and got to a maximum altitude of 71km pushing the life support systems to their maximum. Alexis touched down on runway no.2 and had a hard spin while slowing down but no damage was caused.

February 4 1955 the Jupiter 1E launched carrying a much more advanced and complex biological container. The payloads on the capsule was a small dog, a few insects and some other instruments. the rocket launched in the early afternoon and met altitude requirements of 140km (86 miles) and speeds above 2km/s (0.6 miles/s).

The small dog was recovered alive in the Australian outback after an exhilarating launch. This launch was also the capstone mission for the suborbital research sub-program and the organization takes on a new goal of reaching orbit using a Jupiter missile.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

B-003d breaks records for the fastest speed a jet aircraft got up to mach 2.44 and landed after a 28 minute flight. The Ac-003b also had another flight up to 70km, the aircraft showed major instability on landing which was reported by Alexis and the newly appointed second pilot Connie Rodriguez who was watching from the ground. the aircraft will be retired because of this and due to further contracts needing a much more improved life support systems.

[Evebaek]

September 1955 marks a new age for space flight and exploration. In the early morning on the 29th the Jupiter 2 rocket was rolled onto the launch pad with a small robotic probe called Frontiers 1. The Jupiter 2 rocket is an upgraded Jupiter 1 missile with longer tanks and a better engine along with a second stage that uses the same engines as the Accelerator test planes along with a solid rocket kick stage in its fairing. the Frontiers 1 probe is an additional solid rocket motor with basic avionics on top just built to communicate and send basic telemetry data.

The rocket launched in the late morning with much higher speeds than seen before and quickly ascending out of view and into the clouds. the first stage performed perfectly throughout most of it's burn however just before cutoff the stage experienced a major movement putting the rocket off its trajectory but was able to correct its self after some seconds and fuel was wasted.

2 minutes after launch the first stage was expended of fuel and the second stage separated and ignited. The variant of the XLR-11 used on this rocket has new functions installed because of the inability to use aerodynamics to control the stage at this altitude which is very crude thrust vectoring bu having the chambers of the engine throttle to control the stages pitch, yaw and roll (roll by having small pieces of carbon go into the exhaust to provide role similar to the RD-101 and its variants). the second stage is expected to burn  for a few minutes bringing the probe to speeds unseen before a planned separation of a spin stabilized kickstage.

During the second stages burn it experienced oscillations from along its pitch axis from +5.6 degrees to -6.7 degrees. it is unknown what caused these but it is believed that the probe will only have a slim chance of making orbit with these inefficiencies.

So as the second stages fuel depleted it placed itself into a roll and commanded ignition of the first solid booster, which fired of normally. upon the final boosters ignition the oscillations caused by the second stage became more apparent moving the probe along its pitch and heading. The booster flamed out with the space craft at an apoapsis of 564km (349 miles) and a periapsis of (60 miles).

The probe lost contact with ground stations after a few minutes after burnout and was never reestablished and it is believed that it burned up in the atmosphere.

Even though this attempt failed it demonstrated the rockets capabilities and its stages ability to perform. the next Jupiter 2 launch is expected to happen in early 1956 with minor stability improvements to the second stage, an additional solid booster on the kick stage and scientific experiments on the probe itself.