OPAD: an innovative rocket engine health monitoring systems

The Optical Plume Anomaly Detection (OPAD) program, supported by NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, is an effort to provide rocket engine health monitoring via spectrometric detection of anomalous atomic and molecular species in the exhaust plume. Years of developmental work have evolved a system that has had recent success during routine testing with identifying engine threatening erosions in the Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME). Recently, an OPAD instrument flew aboard the Delta Clipper Experimental Advanced (DC-XA) test vehicle. Currently, OPAD researchers are preparing to deliver a flight ready health monitor by the year 1999 for scheduled flight experiments on the Shuttle.