Young engineers Space program Story

Hello my friends, I left you Last time as I was being introduced to my new Lead engineer George Knudsen and fellow engineer John Baldwin. Our task from this point on in the program was to write the test procedures for Stage pressurization and Ground pneumatics for the Second Stage Rocket for the Saturn V moon launch vehicle. We finally received the all our ground servicing equipment (GSE) to perform the previously mentioned systems which was basically huge mechanical consoles to provide the regulated pressure needed to maintain the pressure in the Stage Hydrogen and Oxygen fuel tanks. Our ground pneumatics consisted of providing the operating medium to the our stage systems which consisted of providing the pressure to fueling engineers and propulsion engineering teams. Not really to exciting to write about but highly important to the program.

Each of us (George, John and myself) had a few specialized tasks in our support rolls). My specific function as low man on the team was to to take samples of environment of the Hydrogen and Oxygen tanks to insure it was safe to proceed with fueling which was primarily taking a sample of the helium in each cell on a gas analyzer to make sure the moisture content was low enough to proceed with fueling. My secondary task was to secure the Rocket following a test firing and make sure it was safe for our technicians' to return to the stage GSE to shutdown the systems which required manually closing of all the different Ground Support equipment valves. Not to exciting but before I would allow them to enter the stage area we had to make sure there were no leaks or fires caused by the firing of the J2 engines. Following each stage firing I would send in three technicians to inspect the stand and GSE (Ground Servicing Equipment), This was very important due to the tremendous vibration of the stand created by the engines which was over a million pounds of thrust. What made it so dangerous was if there was hydrogen leak somewhere and ignited it could not be seen since a hydrogen flame is virtually invisible and since we were working with 3000 PSI systems if there was a fire the Technicians could be instantly burned to death. Our safety engineer was overly concerned and wanted to know how I was going to protect the inspection team when I sent them to the test stand. I explained that I would have each technician take with them a common household broom and after each firing they would enter the test stand holding the broom out in front of them and sweeping the air in search for a hydrogen leak which as I mention would be burning. The first time following a test firing I made sure each technician had a broom and I explained how I wanted them to procced once they were entering the test stand. Now appreciate I was only 24 at the time and I think they thought I was rather weird with this broom idea. That was until our second cluster (5 engine) firing. As directed, one of the technicians upon entering the test stand while holding the broom out in front of himself walked around one of the ground GSE units (which stood about 5 feet high) and instantly the broom ignited. Without the broom he could have instantly been cut in two as he turned the corner and burned to death as well. As you can imagine to his surprise, the broom saved his life as well as notified us in the control center we had a fire and needed us to take appropriate action which was to secure the hydrogen system upstream which we had that capability.
Once the system was secured and we entered the test stand we found a 2 inch hydrogen fitting on one of the GSE equipment had failed. Like I said, Not really to exciting; but a life saving measure. To be continued (if you wish).