LEAP Profile

LEAP was an early 1960's British design for getting disabled astronauts on the lunar surface quickly to lunar orbit for ferrying home.

The disabled crew member would be laid horizontally in a cylindrical pressurized capsule. Guidance was by a simple timer. At the necessary moment before the rescue craft passed overhead, the engine on the litter would ignite and send it straight up for 56 seconds, attaining a velocity sufficient to reach the fixed 61 km altitude of the rescue craft orbit. The nozzle would then swivel and fire along the long axis of the litter, accelerating it to the 1570 m/s orbital velocity of the rescue craft. Rendezvous operations and transfer of the crew were up to the rescue craft.

Crew Size: 1. Length: 2.80 m (9.10 ft). Maximum Diameter: 0.50 m (1.64 ft). Span: 1.30 m (4.20 ft). Habitable Volume: 0.50 m3. Mass: 292 kg (643 lb). Payload: 98 kg (216 lb). Main Engine Thrust: 2.883 kN (648 lbf). Main Engine Propellants: N2O4/UDMH. Main Engine Propellants: 170 kg (370 lb). Main Engine Isp: 249 sec. Spacecraft delta v: 2,130 m/s (6,980 ft/sec).

• Carton, D S, Technology of Lunar Exploration, "LEAP", 1961.