Is The Shuttle’s Safety As Certain As A Card Shuffle’s Outcome?
Are U.S. officials tempting fate by giving the green-light to the accident-prone space shuttle? The answer: we’ll soon find out.
NASA Administrator Michael Griffin has cleared the space shutting Discovery for launch on July 1, reports CBS News correspondent Bob Orr, over-riding warnings from his own chief engineer and top safety officials.“If we’re going to fly, we need to accept some programmatic risk and get on with it,” Griffin said Saturday.
And, indeed, there are two ways to view that assertion: (1)A risky attitude, or (2)A fact that new frontiers have never been explored without undertaking an element of risk. And there is certainly some risk:
The risk involves foam on the shuttle’s huge external fuel tank. NASA safety officials are worried that foam could break off from brackets securing pressurization lines and damage the shuttle’s heat shield.In their risk analysis, officials label that failure as “probable/catastrophic,” meaning it is “probable” that sometime in the final 17 shuttle flights, foam will be shed with “catastrophic results.”
Not exactly confidence inducing? But is it acceptable risk?
A large piece of foam doomed Columbia in 2003 when it punched a hole in the wing. Another large piece just missed Discovery when it took off last July.Griffin insists this time there’s no risk to the crew, as only small pieces of foam can break off the brackets. Even if the shuttle is hit, cameras and sensors will spot the damage. If the astronauts can’t repair it, they’ll scramble to the International Space Station and await a rescue by Shuttle Atlantis.
NASA Chief of Safety and Mission Assurance Officer Bryan O’Connor and Chief Engineer Chris Scolese gave the following statement to CBS News:
“Crew safety is our first and most important concern. I believe, as does Chris, that our crew can safely return from this mission.
“Chris and I both feel that there remain issues with the orbiter — there is the potential that foam may come off at time of launch.
“That’s why we feel we should redesign the ice frost ramp. We do not feel, however, that these issues are a threat to safe return of the crew. We have openly discussed our position in the Flight Readiness Review — open communication is how we work at NASA. The administrator has heard all the different engineering positions, including ours, and has made an informed decision and the agency is accepting this risk with its eyes wide open.”
The Daily Tech reports:
Members of the crew, including Air Force Colonel Steve Lindsey, commander of the mission, arrived at the Kennedy Space Center last week for rehearsals. The decision to launch the spacecraft on July 1 did not come without controversy. Even though debris on the external fuel tank is still a cause for concern, NASA believes Discovery will be able to land safely after its 13-day mission. In case the shuttle is not able to safely return to Earth due to mechanical issues, the shuttle crew will conduct repairs and stay on the ISS until a rescue shuttle arrives.
You can be assured of one thing: the shuttle will be very closely watched…
4 Responses to “Is The Shuttle’s Safety As Certain As A Card Shuffle’s Outcome?”
The shuttle has never come through on its promise of weekly space missions on the cheap. It is an over-engineered (too complex) system that has traded utility and robustness for elegance and pride. Russia has creamed us in space because they hold to the engineering principal :”good enough is good enough.”
But we’re stuck with the shuttle for now, and as long as the Astronauts are on board with the risks, I say go ahead.
WHY ARE WE SO RISK AVERSE? How come we cannot accept the deaths of pioneers as the price of progress? Are we becoming weenies, who will sacrifice the future to protect the safety of a few truly courageous individuals?
If the Astronauts are willing to take a fully informed risk, is the pioneering spirit of America, the spirits that have risked everything to bring humanity to our wonderous present, willing to say NO?
Is The Shuttle’s Safety As Certain As A Card Shuffle’s Outcome?
Ever risk jaywalking? Ever risk beating a yellow light before it turns red at rush hour?
Card shuffling, if its not manipulated, is totally random.
On the other hand Shuttle safety is as certain as humans and computers can make it.
There is “risk” in just going to sleep at night and waking up in the morning. How much “certainty” can be placed on that?
pqrynl,
I agree with you…maybe they should put Burt Rutan in charge of NASA operations…whadda ya think?
Rutan put a man in space and brought him back for .0000001% of what it costs NASA to scratch their butts.
DAMMIT!
I meant to say “On the other hand Shuttle safety is as certain as humans, computers, and tens of billions of tax payer dollars can make it.