NASA Says New Rocket Might Shake Violently

Potential Problem May Destroy Spacecraft

NASA is wrestling with a potentially dangerous problem in a spacecraft that has not even been built yet.

Engineers are concerned that the new rocket, meant to replace the space shuttle and send astronauts to the moon, could shake violently during the first few minutes of flight, possibly destroying the entire vehicle.

"They know it's a real problem," said Paul Fischbeck, a Carnegie Mellon University engineering professor who has consulted on risk issues with NASA in the past. "This thing is going to shake apart the whole structure, and they've got to solve it."

If not corrected, the shaking would arise from the powerful first stage of the Ares I rocket, which will lift the Orion crew capsule into orbit.

NASA officials hope to have a plan for fixing the design as early as March, and they do not expect it to delay the goal of returning astronauts to the moon by 2020.

"I hope no one was so ill-informed as to believe that we would be able to develop a system to replace the shuttle without facing any challenges in doing so," NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said in a statement. "NASA has an excellent track record of resolving technical challenges. We're confident we'll solve this one as well."

Professor Jorge Arenas of the Institute of Acoustics in Valdivia, Chile, acknowledged that the problem is serious but said: "NASA has developed one of the safest and risk-controlled space programs in engineering history."

NASA engineers characterized the shaking as being in what the agency considers the "red zone" of risk, ranking a 5 on a 1-to-5 scale of severity.

"It's highly likely to happen, and if it does, it's a disaster," said Fischbeck, an expert in engineering risks.

The first launch of astronauts aboard Ares I and Orion is set for March 2015.