Category Archives: Space

“Unnecessary Risk”

I got an email on my NRO piece this morning from a David Barnhart:

I would like to offer another point of view. Every astronaut death has been avoidable. Yes, people are going to die when pushing the edge of the envelope. Shit happens. But Grissom, Young, and Chaffee died because the system (NASA) built an unreliable dangerous vehicle. You only have to listen to Grissom’s words days earlier complaining about the communications gear to realize that. Challenger astronauts died because the system did not listen to the real concerns of the scientists and engineers. The foam issue was always an accident waiting to happen. Columbia astronauts died because the system ignored the problem too long.

Soldiers die from EIDs but not because the command structure failed them. The soldiers’ commanders are doing everything they can to eliminate unnecessary risk. That is not the case at NASA.

While it can certainly be argued that NASA management was negligent in the cases of Challenger and Columbia (and the astronauts didn’t understand how risky their missions were), that can’t be said in the current situation, in which everyone, including crew, are aware of the risks now, given the openness of the discussion about it. I’ll bet they’re eager to go, regardless.

It’s very easy to talk about eliminating “unnecessary” risks. It’s a lot harder to get agreement on which risks are “necessary” and which are not. The command structure in Iraq is in fact not “eliminating all unnecessary risks” to the troops. Many (e.g., war opponents) would, in fact, argue that their being in Iraq at all is an “unnecessary risk,” because this was a “war of choice.” Every time they are sent out on patrol without adequate armor, they are taking an “unnecessary risk.” Never mind that they might be less effective in the armor, or that it costs money that might be better spent on other items. No, they’re being forced to take “unnecessary risks,” because soldiers’ lives are of infinite value, just like those of astronauts.

Right?

Every single day that we don’t fly the Shuttle represents another expenditure of over ten million dollars devoted to that program, with zero results. As I said in the column, “safe” is a relative word, not an absolute one. Flying Shuttles will never be “safe.” Neither will flying the new planned CLV/CEV. For that matter, neither is driving down the freeway in your car, and I don’t care what kind of car it is. There is no risk-free state except the grave. People are irrational about this, but we must make tradeoffs every day between safety, money and schedule. Rational people who recognize this develop optimum, cost effective, and relatively reliable and safe systems. Those in denial, who think that complete safety somehow can be achieved, if we only spend enough money, and delay launches long enough, give us Space Shuttle programs.

“Unnecessary Risk”

I got an email on my NRO piece this morning from a David Barnhart:

I would like to offer another point of view. Every astronaut death has been avoidable. Yes, people are going to die when pushing the edge of the envelope. Shit happens. But Grissom, Young, and Chaffee died because the system (NASA) built an unreliable dangerous vehicle. You only have to listen to Grissom’s words days earlier complaining about the communications gear to realize that. Challenger astronauts died because the system did not listen to the real concerns of the scientists and engineers. The foam issue was always an accident waiting to happen. Columbia astronauts died because the system ignored the problem too long.

Soldiers die from EIDs but not because the command structure failed them. The soldiers’ commanders are doing everything they can to eliminate unnecessary risk. That is not the case at NASA.

While it can certainly be argued that NASA management was negligent in the cases of Challenger and Columbia (and the astronauts didn’t understand how risky their missions were), that can’t be said in the current situation, in which everyone, including crew, are aware of the risks now, given the openness of the discussion about it. I’ll bet they’re eager to go, regardless.

It’s very easy to talk about eliminating “unnecessary” risks. It’s a lot harder to get agreement on which risks are “necessary” and which are not. The command structure in Iraq is in fact not “eliminating all unnecessary risks” to the troops. Many (e.g., war opponents) would, in fact, argue that their being in Iraq at all is an “unnecessary risk,” because this was a “war of choice.” Every time they are sent out on patrol without adequate armor, they are taking an “unnecessary risk.” Never mind that they might be less effective in the armor, or that it costs money that might be better spent on other items. No, they’re being forced to take “unnecessary risks,” because soldiers’ lives are of infinite value, just like those of astronauts.

Right?

Every single day that we don’t fly the Shuttle represents another expenditure of over ten million dollars devoted to that program, with zero results. As I said in the column, “safe” is a relative word, not an absolute one. Flying Shuttles will never be “safe.” Neither will flying the new planned CLV/CEV. For that matter, neither is driving down the freeway in your car, and I don’t care what kind of car it is. There is no risk-free state except the grave. People are irrational about this, but we must make tradeoffs every day between safety, money and schedule. Rational people who recognize this develop optimum, cost effective, and relatively reliable and safe systems. Those in denial, who think that complete safety somehow can be achieved, if we only spend enough money, and delay launches long enough, give us Space Shuttle programs.

“Unnecessary Risk”

I got an email on my NRO piece this morning from a David Barnhart:

I would like to offer another point of view. Every astronaut death has been avoidable. Yes, people are going to die when pushing the edge of the envelope. Shit happens. But Grissom, Young, and Chaffee died because the system (NASA) built an unreliable dangerous vehicle. You only have to listen to Grissom’s words days earlier complaining about the communications gear to realize that. Challenger astronauts died because the system did not listen to the real concerns of the scientists and engineers. The foam issue was always an accident waiting to happen. Columbia astronauts died because the system ignored the problem too long.

Soldiers die from EIDs but not because the command structure failed them. The soldiers’ commanders are doing everything they can to eliminate unnecessary risk. That is not the case at NASA.

While it can certainly be argued that NASA management was negligent in the cases of Challenger and Columbia (and the astronauts didn’t understand how risky their missions were), that can’t be said in the current situation, in which everyone, including crew, are aware of the risks now, given the openness of the discussion about it. I’ll bet they’re eager to go, regardless.

It’s very easy to talk about eliminating “unnecessary” risks. It’s a lot harder to get agreement on which risks are “necessary” and which are not. The command structure in Iraq is in fact not “eliminating all unnecessary risks” to the troops. Many (e.g., war opponents) would, in fact, argue that their being in Iraq at all is an “unnecessary risk,” because this was a “war of choice.” Every time they are sent out on patrol without adequate armor, they are taking an “unnecessary risk.” Never mind that they might be less effective in the armor, or that it costs money that might be better spent on other items. No, they’re being forced to take “unnecessary risks,” because soldiers’ lives are of infinite value, just like those of astronauts.

Right?

Every single day that we don’t fly the Shuttle represents another expenditure of over ten million dollars devoted to that program, with zero results. As I said in the column, “safe” is a relative word, not an absolute one. Flying Shuttles will never be “safe.” Neither will flying the new planned CLV/CEV. For that matter, neither is driving down the freeway in your car, and I don’t care what kind of car it is. There is no risk-free state except the grave. People are irrational about this, but we must make tradeoffs every day between safety, money and schedule. Rational people who recognize this develop optimum, cost effective, and relatively reliable and safe systems. Those in denial, who think that complete safety somehow can be achieved, if we only spend enough money, and delay launches long enough, give us Space Shuttle programs.

Glitch

There’s a problem with a vernier thruster heater. I’m not familiar enough with the commit criteria to know if that could result in a launch scrub. It’s certainly not something that can be easily worked on the pad, but there may be sufficient redundancy that they could go anyway. The problem is that for many missions in the past, verniers aren’t necessarily required, but I suspect they don’t want to try to dock to ISS if they’re missing one.

We haven’t left for the Cape yet. We may drive up anyway, just for the drive, and hope for the best, since it will likely be windy and rainy here the rest of the weekend.

By the way, the gang of Florida Today reporters over at The Flame Trench is probably the best place to keep tabs on the launch, at least as far as blogs go.

[Update a few minutes later]

Can’t be fixed on the pad, as I suspected. They’re figuring out now if they can live without it, if necessary. There are so many thrusters on the vehicle (though a lot more primaries than verniers), that I’d guess they can come up with a workaround control scheme.

The problem is either with the thermostat or heater. The heater was supposed to read hot, but it read ambient.

I wonder how they know that it’s not just a failed temperature sensor?

Looking Better

It looks like the weather prospects have improved for the launch today–now only a forty percent chance of getting weathered out, as opposed to earlier estimates of sixty percent. We may drive up and try to see it from Cocoa Beach or Titusville. If they don’t go today, it may be several days before they get better weather, because there’s a tropical wave coming into Florida tonight from the Caribbean. But a successful launch today would be like an early Fourth of July.

Note also that today is the hundred fifty third anniversary of the start of the Battle of Gettysburg.

A View From The Astronaut Office

Here’s an email from a ‘stro (who’s a regular reader, and who reports that others are as well, but has to remain anonymous for what I hope are obvious reasons), on my NRO piece:

…great article in the Nat’l Review online. Agreed with most of it, but it was almost too rational — the public and especially the folks in this Agency have an emotional attachment to the Corps that defies, in my direct experience, all rationality. One of the big advantages the emergents have is that their test pilots will be seen as test pilots, not some sort of symbol for what is great about America. Hence, they are more comfortable taking appropriate risks than this agency can be.

This is actually a very interesting topic — think some sociology student will get a Ph.D. dissertation out of it someday. It’s interesting because it’s also frustrating to us astronauts — we’re more comfortable with the risks & the results of the failures than people who don’t even know the folks involved.

Yes.

Here’s an example of the emotional attachment, from right after Columbia was lost (scroll down to the email from Houston).

I would also note (sadly) how many of my off-the-cuff predictions, including programmatic response, from the initial minutes after hearing about the loss of Columbia have held up.

[Update a little while later]

I’ll note also that NASA hasn’t learned the lesson from Columbia:

The lesson we must take from the most recent shuttle disaster is that we can no longer rely on a single vehicle for our access to the new frontier, and that we must start to build the needed orbital infrastructure in low earth orbit, and farther out, to the moon, so that, in the words of the late Congressman George Brown, “greater metropolitan earth” is no longer a wilderness in which a technical failure means death or destruction.

NASA’s problem hasn’t been too much vision, even for near-earth activities, but much too little. But it’s a job not just for NASA–to create that infrastructure, we will have to set new policies in place that harness private enterprise, just as we did with the railroads in the 19th Century. That is the policy challenge that will come out of the latest setback–to begin to tame the harsh wilderness only two hundred miles above our heads.

I need to finish (errr…..start) my essay on false lessons learned from Shuttle and station.

[Update at 3 PM EDT]

It just occurs to me that, while I don’t know if any sociology students have gotten theses out of it, Tom Wolfe managed to get a best-selling novel, as well as a movie.

[Update at 5 PM EDT]

Popular Mechanics has a blog post on probability of success of Shuttle and other space missions.

One nit (based on a quick read). They’re comparing the probability of lunar mission success to Shuttle probability of crew loss. Apples and oranges. Apollo lost no crew in space (which excludes the pad fire).

Ares

Apparently, that’s the name of the new launch vehicles that NASA wants to develop, which will be announced in a couple hours. The Crew Launch Vehicle (heretofore called CLV) will be the Ares 1, and the Cargo Launch Vehicle (previously known as the CaLV) will be the Ares 5. A tribute to the Saturn numbers, I guess, and an indication of the ultimate planned destination (Barsoom).

Distraction

Amidst all the talk about the Shuttle launch this weekend (hopefully), the fact that we had a successful Delta 4 launch from Vandenberg seems to have gone largely unnoticed. A few more successes of this vehicle and the Atlas V could at least put a stake through the heart of the “stick,” given that the design of it still seems to be in flux, and it’s turning out not to be as “safe, simple or soon” as advertised.

[Update a few minutes later]

This is funny. I decided to link to http://www.safesimplesoon.com, but the site is down. Is it just a temporary problem, or did ATK decide it was an embarrassment?