In preparation of one day sending astronauts into space, SpaceX tested its abort system that would eject the Dragon capsule in the event of a dangerous malfunction.
According to CBS News, the demonstration Wednesday took place at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Base in Florida and simulated an emergency ejection from the launch pad. Unmanned, the capsule shot itself high into the air before it parachutes deployed and it floated down into the ocean.
Powered by eight SuperDraco engines, the Dragon capsule climbed its way to an arced altitude of about 4,500 feet. SpaceX now plans to return the capsule to Texas to put its equipment through a full inspection.
"We're proud to have a launch escape system in case the Falcon 9 is having a bad day," Garrett Reisman,a former shuttle astronaut now serving as director of crew operations for SpaceX, told CBS News. "The Dragon crew can get to safety.
"It's a capability we had on Gemini and Apollo, and we have it on the Soyuz, but we did not enjoy that on the shuttle. We're bringing that back to try and make sure our crews are super safe."
SpaceX is currently under contract with NASA to fly unmanned resupply missions to the International Space Station (ISS). The company is also contracted to eventually start flying astronauts to the ISS aboard a Dragon capsule designed to carry humans. The latter is slated to begin in 2017.
Both contracts signify the U.S. government's desire to end reliance on the Russian Space Agency to send astronauts to and from the ISS. Currently, the U.S. has send its astronauts to Russia and pay the country for their travel on a Soyuz rocket up to the floating science lab.
But if SpaceX and Boeing can do that, then the U.S. could keep those dollars in the country.
