it had become clear that the trajectory would take it into the Atlantic Ocean instead of orbit, and so the Range Safety Officer (RSO) sent the destruct command at T+413 seconds. Investigation showed that the lanyard was not only inadequately designed, but it also was an off-the-shelf component designed for marine equipment and not rockets or aircraft. The lanyard had been noted as a potential problem as early as 1967 and although fixes were made to some Atlas SLVs as well as Atlas E/F series missiles, there was no across-the-board effort to replace them with a more suitable component. The backup Intelsat (Intelsat IV F-1) was launched successfully on AC-35 in May 1975. AC-43 failure Two years later, on 29 September 1977, another attempted launch of an Intelsat (Intelsat IVA F-5) communications satellite took place on AC-43. Shortly after liftoff, abnormal temperatures were detected in the Atlas's thrust section and continued to rise as the booster ascended. A visible thrust section fire could be seen starting at T+33 seconds and sustainer thrust vector control hydraulic pressure was lost at T+55 seconds, causing total loss of vehicle control. The payload fairing and satellite were stripped from the booster, followed by the Atlas exploding as the thrust section fire touched off the propellant tanks at T+60 seconds. The Centaur flew free until being destructed by the Range Safety Officer a few seconds later. NASA and U.S. Air Force officials, already busy investigating the launch failure of a Delta booster three weeks earlier (OTS-1), dredged the Atlas's engines from the ocean floor and sent them to Convair for examination. It was concluded that a gas generator leak caused by improper brazing of a pipe led to overheating and fire in the thrust section of the Atlas. The pipe also suffered corrosion from six years of sitting in a warehouse in the salty air along the Florida coast and the damage was in an area not visible during a preflight examination. The Atlas used on this flight had been delivered to the Cape in 1971 and kept in storage since then, an unusually long time. In the aftermath of the accident, NASA inspected their inventory of Atlas vehicles and found several more improperly brazed pipes which needed replacement. AC-67 failure On 26 March 1987, AC-67 failed to launch a Navy FLTSATCOM satellite. Weather conditions were poor that day, with thick clouds and "moderate to