A saucer-shaped test vehicle successfully soared over the skies of Hawaii on Saturday (June 28), achieving what NASA identified was its first flight's primary objectives despite an experimental parachute failing to deploy.
The high-altitude helium balloon carrying the [URL=http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/tdm/ldsd/]Low-Density Supersonic Decelerator[/URL] (LDSD) lifted off at about 1:40 p.m. CDT (1840 GMT) from its pad at the U.S. Navy's Pacific Missile Range Facility in Kauai, Hawaii. The vehicle, which resembles a flying saucer, is designed to test landing technologies for future Mars missions.
This first of three planned LDSD flights was to determine the flying qualities of the test vehicle. As a bonus, the flight plan also included attempts at deploying two new technologies — an inflatable device and a mammoth parachute. However, those landing technologies were not officially scheduled to be tested until next summer, in two additional LDSD flights.
After liftoff, the balloon carrying the LDSD test vehicle slowly floated upward, taking several hours to reach an altitude of about 120,000 feet (36,600 meters). At that point, the balloon released the vehicle and its solid rocket motor kicked in, boosting the craft to an altitude of approximately 180,000 feet (54,900 meters).
When the craft reached its target altitude and was traveling at about Mach 4, it successfully deployed the first of the new technologies, a doughnut-shaped tube called the Supersonic Inflatable Aerodynamic Decelerator (SIAD). The SIAD decelerated the vehicle to about Mach 2.5.
The LDSD test vehicle then attempted to deploy the Supersonic Disk Sail Parachute — the largest supersonic parachute ever flown — but it did not fully unfurl.
The LDSD craft impacted the Pacific Ocean about 40 minutes after being dropped from its launch balloon.