NASA May Fly Before Changes Are Implemented

kmak writes "According to CBS News, NASA might fly again early next year before changes are made to the management. The changes were requested due to the Columbia accident.. what will happen this time?"

Challenger Accident?

[TheRedHorse]

Um, I think we already know what was destined to happen after the Challenger accident.....Way to go /. editors!

Most likely

[Anonymous Coward]

Nothing... just as nothing happened in most previous flights.

Challenger?

[rumpledstiltskin]

Um....the challenger was a long time ago...I remember because I was in elementary school at the time (hint, I've already graduated college). Are you sure it's not Columbia?

Jeez, thanks for makin' me feel old....

[StressGuy]

I was a sophmore in college, watched it on TV that morning and my elective psychology class wound up being cancelled because the professor was way too depressed over it to teach the class. By the next day, I was already hearing "Need Another Seven Astronauts", "You feed the kids, I'll feed the fish", and so on. I've yet to hear one wisecrack about the Columbia accident though. It seems that times have changed - for the better I think.

Game saving edit....

[rumpledstiltskin]

good job editors. The post originally asserted "Challenger" accident.

Re:Game saving edit....

[Sebby]

The post originally asserted "Challenger" accident.

To bad, then we could've said that they already had flown before they had made the changes....

Oh well, what's a few weeks more? :)

History

[aridhol]

History has shown that, even with the current management, space flight is safe. It has a fairly low accident rate compared with other industries. However, when the do have an accident, it is large and spectacular; everybody sees it, so everybody wants change.

That said, they have identified procedural problems that caused risks. Learn from your mistakes, and move on. You don't need a huge overhaul in management before you can listen to your engineers say "Hey, I think something's wrong here". You listen to your people, and act on their advice.

Re:History

[Dark Nexus]

What? Spaceflight isn't safe. NASA and it's astronauts KNOW it isn't safe. They SAY it isn't safe. 1/200 odds? I don't consider that safe. Worth the risk? Sure, they know what they're getting into. But it's NOT safe.

And on a per-job basis, I doubt many industries have as many major accidents. And believe that they probably have a lot of accidents that you DON'T hear about, they're just minor accidents that are dealt with before they cause any serious issues. Do you hear about every time some wareho

Re:History

[WolfWithoutAClause]

Actually, it's pretty lousy. You have a 2% death rate per flight. That's worse than base jumping (jumping off mountains/cliffs/fixed structures with parachutes, base jumping is often illegal.) About the only thing I know with an equivalent death rate is climbing everest.

The letter "C"

[Euphonious Coward]

It's clear that only shuttles whose names start with the letter "C" blow up. Have we run through them all yet? If so, it's clear sailing!

Aargh...

[secolactico]

NASA May Fly

You mean, it will only have a life span of two days??

*ducks*

It's all about the $$$

[MacEnvy]

Until we give NASA more money, they can't do a hell of a lot. They tried "faster, better, cheaper", and realized what NetAdmins have known all along - you can only have two out of three.

Bottom line - give 1% of the current defense spending to NASA instead, and we'd have a hell of a space program.

/rant

Unless

[Dachannien]

Unless it was an upper-level manager who fell and struck the wing of the Columbia during takeoff, I think they'll be fine.

Re:Unless

[Tackhead]

> Unless it was an upper-level manager who fell and struck the wing of the Columbia during takeoff, I think they'll be fine.

If it was an upper-level manager that struck the leading edge of the wing, they'd have launched a rescue shuttle the next morning.

10-pound hunk of ice hitting delicate TPS panel at 500 mph? After all, upper-level managers all agreed, on the basis of old tests with 3" cubes of foam, that it presented no risk despite the report saying that what happened was "significantly out

Re:Unless

[Matrix2110]

Tack, I am being stupid as usual. However, I feel I am being dissed for no reason. I am willing to accept your judgement due to your excellent record. And I will agree to whatever you decide.

Look for yourself.

Matrix2110

The offending thread:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=74111&cid=66 53 433

Shuttle: wrong tool for the wrong era

[vudufixit]

The shuttle is far too expensive, complex and yes, dangerous. The "change" NASA needs to make would be to scrap the shuttle, and investigate a cheaper, safer and more reliable "people mover" for getting humans spaceborne, and a different, perhaps expendable vehicle for the automated lofting of space station components, satellites and deep space probes. A mission featuring one of each would diminish the chance of a single point of failure destroying both at once, as happens when a shuttle goes. We also have a golden opportunity to work with the Chinese on their burgeoning space program. Why not make them into partners instead of competitors?

Re:Shuttle: wrong tool for the wrong era

[Bob Vila's Hammer]

We have all seen during the cold war, specifically the Soviet and American space race, that competition gets the best results. I think the case in point is the moon landings of the Apollo missions, NASA's (and the world's) ultimate space faring success. They just need more money. Money is what worked then, and it will work now if they had more. Space is expensive no matter what.

But thats not to say that it will take a hatred or a war to divy up the teams. Real, intense and creative competition is wha

Re:Shuttle: wrong tool for the wrong era

[jwdg]

We have all seen during the cold war, specifically the Soviet and American space race, that competition gets the best results. I think the case in point is the moon landings of the Apollo missions, NASA's (and the world's) ultimate space faring success. They just need more money. Money is what worked then, and it will work now if they had more. Space is expensive no matter what.

Of course, space exploration is expensive - human spaceflight more so. This leads to a vicious circle where commercial contract

Re:Shuttle: wrong tool for the wrong era

[foooo]

I was with you until you said "work with the Chinese"

Are you insane?

1) We shouldn't trust them because they've proven to be untrustworthy in the past.

2) Sharing space programs would require trust because of the need to share dual use technology.

3) Human rights violations mean that we shouldn't even be *trading* with China, let alone participating in a space program with them.

4) We have way cooler names for our rockets. Shenzhou IV? eh?? translation: Sacred Vessel IV?? How could this possibly compar

Exponential Improvement Trend

[DumbSwede]

50 flights, WAM ! Challenger tragedy. 100 more flights, Columbia tragedy. This is simplistic extrapolation on my part, but I would expect on the order of 200 flights before the next catastrophic failure (a doubling of safety for every mishap), assuming we have learned from the design flaws that lead to this one.

I guess one could ask if 1:200 is an acceptable risk. Oddly, NASA use to believe that it was, as I have seen 1:200 as the expected failure rate in some risk analysis estimates (granted I have al

Re:Exponential Improvement Trend

[promethean_spark]

Um, more like 51 flights, *wham*, 62 more flights *wham*. Seems more like a fairly constant ~2% failure rate. They'll inspect the TPS in orbit after this though, that should improve rentry safety considerably.