Safety Design for Space Systems

Chapter 21. Pyrotechnic Safety

Keith E. Van Tassel

Pyrotechnics Project Manager and Explosives Safety Officer, Johnson Space Center, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Houston, Texas

Contents

21.1 Pyrotechnic Devices 695

21.2 Electroexplosive Devices 696

21.1. Pyrotechnic Devices

During the era of the NASA Apollo Program, engineers who used explosives in the design of separation systems, emergency escape systems, and landing and deceleration systems chose to call these types of energetic devices pyrotechnics as opposed to ordnance.

The range of pyrotechnic devices encompasses all components and assemblies that contain or are operated or actuated by propellants or explosives. Such devices include items such as initiators, detonators, safe ...