Rockets - From Small Beginnings
The two giant rockets standing against the wall in the foyer of the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum (NASM) on the National Mall in Washington DC are examples of nuclear weaponry banned by international treaty between the United States and the-then Soviet Union.
The 16.5m-tall yellow/green one on the far left of the image with the complicated nose cone is the road-mobile RSD-10 'Pioneer' in Russian, a two-stage, solid-propellant missile with three 150-kT multiple targetable re-entry warheads. It was known by NATO as the SS-20 Saber.
The exterior of the first stage is yellow fibreglass with numbers and Cyrillic letters printed along the circumference. The letters and numbers are used as guides in the manufacturing process when the solid fuel is covered with fibreglass. The second stage has similar markings. Along the base of the missile are white fan stabilisers that assist in guidance.
The Votkinsk Machine Building Plant constructed the missile for the exhibition at the NASM. Exhibition of this missile complies with the Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF Treaty) agreement that provided for the preservation of 15 SS-20 and Pershing II missiles to commemorate the first international agreement to ban an entire class of nuclear arms exhibition. It does not contain fuel or any live components. The Ministry of Defense of the USSR donated the missile to the Smithsonian.
Its smaller partner is the 10.6m-high Pershing II, a road-mobile solid-propellant missile deployed by the US Army at American bases in West Germany beginning in 1983, aimed at targets in the western Soviet Union. Each carried a single, variable-yield thermonuclear warhead with an explosive force equivalent to 5-50 kT of TNT. This example is a trainer, but its dimensions and weight are identical to an operational Pershing II. It was built by Martin Marietta and transferred by the Army Missile Command to NASM in 1990.
And in the right foreground are the humble beginnings of the American rocket programme, featuring Robert Goddard's (1882-1945) world’s-first liquid-propellant rocket. His rickety contraption (the cone-shaped skeletal frame in the lower right of the image is a replica), with its combustion chamber and nozzle on top, burned for 20 seconds before consuming enough liquid oxygen and gasoline to lift itself off the launch rack. The rocket took off from a snowy field outside Worcester, MA., in March 1926, reaching a height of about 12.5m and a distance of 56m. The original was smashed on impact. Goddard, his wife Esther, and a couple of assistants from Clark University, where he was a physics professor, were the only witnesses.
The 6.7m-tall Goddard P-series rocket standing adjacent to the cone frame is likely the one that jammed in the launch tower on 10 October 1941 and failed to lift-off. The series was so designated because they contained his propellant pumps. They were also his largest and last liquid-fuel rockets and were tested at Roswell, NM., during 1938-1941.
It is probably the same rocket that was launched twice, 9 August 1940 and 8 May 1941, and repaired after each flight. In both cases, the rocket reached a very low velocity and only about 90m in the first test and about 75m in the second. The tests were discontinued because Goddard moved in 1942 to Annapolis, MD., to undertake wartime work for the Navy.
Rockets - From Small Beginnings
The two giant rockets standing against the wall in the foyer of the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum (NASM) on the National Mall in Washington DC are examples of nuclear weaponry banned by international treaty between the United States and the-then Soviet Union.
The 16.5m-tall yellow/green one on the far left of the image with the complicated nose cone is the road-mobile RSD-10 'Pioneer' in Russian, a two-stage, solid-propellant missile with three 150-kT multiple targetable re-entry warheads. It was known by NATO as the SS-20 Saber.
The exterior of the first stage is yellow fibreglass with numbers and Cyrillic letters printed along the circumference. The letters and numbers are used as guides in the manufacturing process when the solid fuel is covered with fibreglass. The second stage has similar markings. Along the base of the missile are white fan stabilisers that assist in guidance.
The Votkinsk Machine Building Plant constructed the missile for the exhibition at the NASM. Exhibition of this missile complies with the Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF Treaty) agreement that provided for the preservation of 15 SS-20 and Pershing II missiles to commemorate the first international agreement to ban an entire class of nuclear arms exhibition. It does not contain fuel or any live components. The Ministry of Defense of the USSR donated the missile to the Smithsonian.
Its smaller partner is the 10.6m-high Pershing II, a road-mobile solid-propellant missile deployed by the US Army at American bases in West Germany beginning in 1983, aimed at targets in the western Soviet Union. Each carried a single, variable-yield thermonuclear warhead with an explosive force equivalent to 5-50 kT of TNT. This example is a trainer, but its dimensions and weight are identical to an operational Pershing II. It was built by Martin Marietta and transferred by the Army Missile Command to NASM in 1990.
And in the right foreground are the humble beginnings of the American rocket programme, featuring Robert Goddard's (1882-1945) world’s-first liquid-propellant rocket. His rickety contraption (the cone-shaped skeletal frame in the lower right of the image is a replica), with its combustion chamber and nozzle on top, burned for 20 seconds before consuming enough liquid oxygen and gasoline to lift itself off the launch rack. The rocket took off from a snowy field outside Worcester, MA., in March 1926, reaching a height of about 12.5m and a distance of 56m. The original was smashed on impact. Goddard, his wife Esther, and a couple of assistants from Clark University, where he was a physics professor, were the only witnesses.
The 6.7m-tall Goddard P-series rocket standing adjacent to the cone frame is likely the one that jammed in the launch tower on 10 October 1941 and failed to lift-off. The series was so designated because they contained his propellant pumps. They were also his largest and last liquid-fuel rockets and were tested at Roswell, NM., during 1938-1941.
It is probably the same rocket that was launched twice, 9 August 1940 and 8 May 1941, and repaired after each flight. In both cases, the rocket reached a very low velocity and only about 90m in the first test and about 75m in the second. The tests were discontinued because Goddard moved in 1942 to Annapolis, MD., to undertake wartime work for the Navy.