SpaceX Finally Confirms Dragon Capsule Explosion

by Ryan Whitwam

SpaceX has finally confirmed what we all suspected — its Dragon II spacecraft was totally destroyed during a test late last month. The admission comes from the company’s vice president of mission assurance Hans Koenigsmann. During a recent press event, Koenigsmann addressed the loss of the capsule and provided the first official details on the “anomaly,” as SpaceX calls it.

The private spaceflight company founded by Elon Musk is one of two firms developing spacecraft for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program along with Boeing. SpaceX was riding high on recent successes including the Dragon II test flight to the International Space Station (ISS) and the first commercial Falcon Heavy launch when tragedy struck on April 20th. The only official word at the time was that an anomaly had occurred on the test stand. Observers noted a cloud of smoke rising from Cape Canaveral. Later, a leaked video showed the capsule exploding.

Koenigsmann seemed to confirm the issue arose from the Dragon’s SuperDraco thrusters. The cargo Dragon and Dragon II both have smaller Draco engines, and those tested fine on the spacecraft. However, something happened as SpaceX prepared to fire the SuperDraco engines. These engines use hypergolic liquid fuel to produce enough thrust to pull the crew capsule away from a Falcon 9 rocket…