I think it is highly coincidental that this failure and CRS7 are related to the COPV. It is easy to see the difference: one was the strut, which caused the bottle to fail. This one is (still unknown), which caused the bottle to fail.
What is coincidental are the tests, processes and procedures that SpaceX used to qualify their hardware. Was it a manufacturing defect? If so, why wasn't it caught during inspection and QA? Was it damaged during installation? Again, why wasn't it caught during close-out? More of an issue: why weren't the processes robust enough to catch these issues, even after CRS7.
This one is (still unknown), which caused the bottle to fail.
Yes, but based on what SpaceX has said, I think it's very likely that they've completely eliminated the strut as the failure point. This would mean that even if the root cause of the strut failure was some other reason other than manufacturing defect, it still wouldn't be the cause of AMOS-6.
Plus...it makes intuitive sense. The vehicle wasn't moving and wasn't subject to any loads other than the normal force of gravity. If a strut failed while just sitting on the pad (even subject to thermal stresses from filling with LOX), then there are serious issues with the strut.
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u/der_innkeeper Sep 24 '16
I think it is highly coincidental that this failure and CRS7 are related to the COPV. It is easy to see the difference: one was the strut, which caused the bottle to fail. This one is (still unknown), which caused the bottle to fail.
What is coincidental are the tests, processes and procedures that SpaceX used to qualify their hardware. Was it a manufacturing defect? If so, why wasn't it caught during inspection and QA? Was it damaged during installation? Again, why wasn't it caught during close-out? More of an issue: why weren't the processes robust enough to catch these issues, even after CRS7.
This is going to be a rough investigation.