Titan With Secret Payload Blows Up : Spy Satellite Believed Lost at Vandenberg

VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE â€”  A Titan 34-D rocket believed to be carrying a secret spy satellite exploded seconds after blasting off from this California coastal base Friday in another stunning setback for the nation’s crippled space program.

It was the second failure in a row of a Titan 34-D, the powerhouse of unmanned launch systems. Although the Titan has had a long record of successful launches, the powerful explosion at 10:45 a.m. further traumatized a space program that has littered both coasts with debris.

The rocket, which is powerful enough to carry a large truck into orbit, exploded just after lifting off from Vandenberg’s Launch Complex Four near the southern border of the base 130 miles northwest of Los Angeles. An orange fireball was visible for miles, and structures 60 miles away shook from the force of the explosion.

Damage Limited

The blast sent a toxic “mushroom cloud� drifting along the coastline, but there were no reports of serious injuries and damage was limited to the launch complex itself, Air Force officials said. Several Air Force sources said emphatically that there were no nuclear materials in the payload.

The launch pad for the space shuttle, which has been under construction for several years, is some distance away and was not damaged, Air Force Maj. Ron Rand said.

Although Air Force officials said only that the payload was “classified,� several aerospace experts said the Titan was believed to be carrying a sophisticated photo reconnaissance satellite.

Residents for many miles around reported either seeing the cloud or feeling vibrations from the blast.

Eric Libby, 21, a pilot, had just landed his small plane at the Lompoc airport near the base when he saw the explosion.

‘Great Ball of . . . Flame’

“I saw a great big ball of orange flame,� he said. “You could see pieces burning, falling to the earth. Then out the top there was a big mushroom cloud of smoke or gas that went up thousands of feet.�

Maj. Gen. Jack L. Watkins, commander of the 1st Strategic Aerospace Division at Vandenberg, met briefly with reporters just outside the gates, but no reporters were allowed to enter the base or view the launch pad.

Asked what caused the accident, Watkins said: “Seconds after the planned liftoff we had an explosion. That is as much as I can tell you about classified type activities.�

He said pieces of the rocket fell “in sort of a circle around the launch pad. All of the materials landed on land.�

Burning Near Site

From the air, grasslands around the pad appeared to have burned, but Watkins said, “We did not have a wildfire, or brush fire as you know it in California.�

The burning, he said, resulted from “smoldering in some spots.�

Although no one was reported seriously injured, Air Force officials said 58 people were treated at the base hospital and three were admitted. Watkins said the victims--47 military personnel and 11 civilians--had complained of burning eyes and skin.

A Vandenberg spokesman, Lt. Col. Harold Rothgeb, said 173 people were initially trapped in the launch control facility, a reinforced concrete bunker above ground less than a mile from the launch pad, but later were safely taken to another part of the base.

Linda Keith, relief manager of the Flagwaver Motel in Lompoc, said she is familiar with rocket launches and knew something was wrong when she saw the cloud.

“Sure it alarmed me,� she said. “I know people that work at Vandenberg. The color was wrong. . . . I saw a reddish-orange glow. . . . When the launch goes right, you just see a white cloud.�

Highly Toxic Fuel

Air Force officials insisted that the incident posed no danger to the communities near the base, but the liquid fuel used aboard a Titan rocket is known to be highly toxic and there were considerable fears concerning the toxicity of the reddish cloud that formed after the explosion.

A Titan 34-D uses two solid rocket boosters, similar to but smaller than the booster that is believed to have caused the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger on Jan. 28, but its main thrust comes from liquid fueled motors that burn a mixture of dimethylhydrazine and nitrogen tetroxide.

William Cruice, vice president and associate chief scientist with Hazards Research Corp. in Rockaway, N.J., an expert on fire and explosion hazards, said dimenthylhydrazine is fatal to laboratory rats even at concentrations as low as 252 parts per billion for four hours.

“It’s highly corrosive and irritating to the skin, eyes and mucous membranes,� he said.

Nitrogen tetroxide, Cruice said, can cause pulmonary problems in humans when inhaled at concentrations of 64 parts per million.

To avoid exposure, Cruice recommended keeping children inside, a move several school administrators made instinctively as soon as the rocket exploded.

Protection From Wind

However, winds kept the cloud offshore, thus limiting exposure to the civilians.

The Titan, first launched in 1963, has long been regarded as one of the more reliable launch systems, and the 34-D was the latest in the line, designed to lift heavy payloads into orbit. Friday’s launch was the ninth of the 34-D.

Before Friday, the most recent launch of a Titan 34-D was on Aug. 29, 1985. That launch went smoothly for the first two minutes, but seconds before the main engines were to shut down, one of the engines began to fail.

By then the rocket was many miles away. Air Force officials have never issued a public report of what happened to the rocket, but one source indicated that it was destroyed as soon as the malfunction was discovered.

With the space shuttle sidelined for at least a year, the back-to-back Titan failures apparently have left the nation with no means of launching heavy payloads into orbit.

Staff writers Scott Harris and Louis Sahagun assisted in preparing this report from Vandenberg Air Force Base.

THE TITAN MISSILE The Titan, largest of all U.S. intercontinental ballistic missiles , has been operational since 1963. Titan III/34D rocket satellite launchers are replacing Titan II missiles, which are being phased out. Total Height: 84.5 feet Diameter: 11.1 feet Launch Weight: 257,000 pounds Propulsion: Solid boosters and 2-stage liquid propellant rocket motors. Speed: More than 36,400 miles per hour. Contractor: Martin Marietta Aeorspace, Bethesda, Md.