How to rescue Dragon, Starliner, and Orion crews at sea

[Chris Bergin]

How to rescue Dragon, Starliner, and Orion crews at sea
By Chris Gebhardt:

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2019/04/rescue-dragon-starliner-orion-crews-sea/

https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight/status/1122199417061355521

[litton4]

Great Article.

One thing not mentioned, however is the fact that Apollo capsules had 3 (iirc) flotation bags at the top, which were inflated after landing.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think these had the ability to right the capsule if it did land in Stable II.
(or were they found not to be effective, given the picture of Skylab 4 shown - no bags in sight).

I've not seen this mentioned in connection with the 3 current capsules, so I assume they don't have these.

[Steven Pietrobon]

Orion has inflatables on top. On EFT-1, only two of them inflated properly.

[woods170]

Orion has inflatables on top. On EFT-1, only two of them inflated properly.

That's not the entire story. Four of the five airbags inflated properly, with one failing to inflate. Of the four inflated airbags two quickly lost pressure due to faulty plumbing inside the high-pressure Helium inflation system.