Share your Mission Abort Systems

[RocketPilot573]

I have this space shuttle... I have not been able to get it to fly properly, with ever single flight ending in disaster. So I just press abort and BAM, the cockpit is ripped out of the craft! Of course, this is one of the few times that I can save my poor pilots... Blown up during launch... Ran out of fuel during landing... Rover driving off a cliff... Stranded in deep space... and so many other failures that really could have used one of these contraptions.

So, how do YOU save your Kerbals from imminent doom? How do you rescue your Kerbals in the event of a mission failure?

Or do you not care for the crew at all...

[Bioman222]

I have had some previous Juno designs that had LES's on them, now let me go dig a picture of them up...

EDIT: Found some!

Here's whats probably a launch escape test:

Also, here's a picture of my set up for parachutes in .16

Edited October 15, 2013 by Bioman222

[Depth]

Frankly, I just press quickload.

However I did experiment a bit with putting a few seperatrons on the command pod and disabling all engines in the abort action group. Never incorporated anything standard into my designs.

In my current save I have a sort of "whatever you need, stick it on the end over there"-kind ragtag spacestation. My minmus Kethane mining operation was manned from day 1 on this save, but I only rarely thought about having any kind of return vehicle for them. Then I decided to man the spacestation. As I thought about how insanely claustrophobic and terrifying it must be to be stuck on a hunk of metal and rocketfuel with no way off, I decided to make a 1-way return vessel. I slapped together a Mk2 pod with two hitchhiker modules, some fuel and a couple of radial chutes. As I docked it, it briefly struck my mind that perhaps I should have tested it for re-entry to make sure it's not a massive deathtrap. Time will tell.

[shoveycat]

Pf, safety, waste of funding i say

[Astronaut]

I have chairs attached to rockets with parachutes that can land on the planet safely but I still need to rescue them.

[TheDarkStar]

Pfff, safety? Waste of funding I say.

Yeah, I agree. Why add safety measures when they come in the millions anyway?

[Depth]

I have chairs attached to rockets with parachutes

This springs to mind:

[CalculusWarrior]

I absolutely love LES's, and using the Procedural Fairings mod, I have created one that looks quite similar to the Apollo escape tower for my 'Nova' rocket:

Here it is in action:

I think the rocket is performing better without the command pod; why did we even include it anyway?

[Whackjob]

Action group 1: Detonate everything

Action group 2: Print off a series of condolence letters

Action group 3: Put letters in outbox

Action group 4: Hire more greysuits

[zxczxczbfg]

I've got an "orbital coatrack", basically a fuel tank, engines, solar panels, and RCS on one end of a long truss with a shielded docking port on the other end. The truss has about a dozen external chairs on it, and when something happens to the station that threatens its continued operation (debris encounter, docking accident, etc.), I just EVA all my Kerbals over to the coatrack, undock it, and fly it about a kilometer away. I then leave them there. And when I get another station, I've already got a dozen Kerbals in orbit to stock it with!

[Bioman222]

I have chairs attached to rockets with parachutes

That sounds like a normal rocket to me.

[Guest]

I don't normally bother with LES because it's just more parts, but when I was putting together a stock Soyuz-alike I decided to do one because I had actually included the retro rockets on the re-entry capsule and I figured "why not make it complete?" Still missing fairings:

Here is the abort system engaging:

And the retro-rockets firing (I hit them a bit too early because I wanted to get the screenshot, but it'll land safely without them so I'm never really worried):