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August 26, 2003

Columbia panel releases final report on accident

By Jim Dallas

The Columbia Accident Investigation Board released its final report on the disintegration of the Space Shuttle Columbia this morning. The 248-page report can be found here.

If even a few of the Board's recommendations are adopted, there will be major repercussions in the way NASA is run (and indirectly, the economy of the Houston area).

The Board's press release pretty nicely summarizes the report --

The CAIB report concludes that while NASA's present Space Shuttle is not inherently unsafe, a number of mechanical fixes are required to make the Shuttle safer in the short term. The report also concludes that NASA's management system is unsafe to manage the shuttle system beyond the short term and that the agency does not have a strong safety culture.

The Board determined that physical and organizational causes played an equal role in the Columbia accident - that the NASA organizational culture had as much to do with the accident as the foam that struck the Orbiter on ascent. The report also notes other significant factors and observations that may help prevent the next accident.

The Board crafted the report to serve as a framework for a national debate about the future of human space flight, but suggests that it is in the nation's interest to replace the Shuttle as soon as possible as the primary means for transporting humans to and from Earth orbit.

It cannot be stressed enough how much the report emphasizes a lack of national leadership (for well over 30 years) in being an institutional cause of the Columbia tragedy; much of Part II and Part III of the report is a siren call for more funding and serious, Apollo-like goals:

Since the 1970s, NASA has not been charged with carrying out a similar high priority mission that would justify the expenditures of resources on a scale equivalent to those allocated for Project Apollo. The result is the agency has found it necessary to gain the support of diverse constituencies. NASA has had to participate in the give and take of the normal political process in order to obtain the resources needed to carry out its programs. NASA has usually failed to receive budgetary support consistent with its ambitions. The result, as noted throughout Part Two of the report, is an organization straining to do too much with too little. - Page 209

As a matter of political reality, the Board suggests that the Space Shuttle be replaced with a more reliable means of accessing low-earth orbit in the near-to-medium term (a program which the Bush administration killed a couple years ago). The report says that "previous attempts to develop a replacement vehicle for the aging Shuttle represent a failure of national leadership. (211)"

Posted by Jim Dallas at August 26, 2003 03:56 PM | TrackBack

Comments

The shuttle is a mess.

The cockiness of the NASA flight management crew is untold. I work in the aerospace field, and some of the report I read, facts they simply brushed off as "it happens" and "no big deal" would have killed off any mission if it occured in a lesser degree.

I also am in shock that we send 70's technology up in space half a dozen times a year.

Sure, the computers and hardware are upgraded, but that is still a late 60's designed vehicle.

Think we could do better after 40 years of advancements?

Posted by: Josh at August 26, 2003 06:27 PM

I watched Alien today, with Tom Skerritt and Sigourney Weaver taking advice from a glorified Apple IIC.

It's clearly dated.

Incidentally, the space shuttle is about the same vintage (Alien was made in 1979; the Shuttle first flew in 1980).

If the Space Shuttle were a Hollywood movie, we'd laugh at it.

Posted by: Jim D at August 27, 2003 03:06 AM

Exactly, but don't forget, when your dating it, that the shuttle was in development in the mid to late 60's, as it took a good decade to work ou the kinks in developing a reusable space orbiter.

Funny point by the way.

Posted by: Josh at August 27, 2003 02:36 PM
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