Orbital's Soviet Rocket Engines Had Already Been Slated for Retirement

Even before the launch destruction of an Orbital Sciences Antares rocket, the commercial space company was planning to retire the half-century-old Russian engines suspected as a potential cause of the failure.

The Soviet-era AJ-26 engine was designed in the 1960s as part of Russia’s space race with the U.S., originally envisioned as a way to propel cosmonauts to the moon. The engines are “refurbished and Americanized,” Frank Culbertson, the Orbital Sciences executive in charge of the NASA program, said Tuesday night in a news conference, defending the AJ-26 as “very robust and rugged” and with a successful track record.

At least one person in the industry disagrees. Elon Musk, the founder of rival launch company SpaceX, ridiculed the Antares AJ-26 engine in an interview with Wired magazine two years ago. Musk said most commercial space companies seek “to optimize their ass-covering” by avoiding risk and employing antiquated but proven technologies. SpaceX builds an “octaweb” of nine of its own Merlin engines for its Falcon 9 rocket. Here is Musk’s riff on the AJ-26: