Discovery astronauts fly to Florida for launch this Saturday
I'm sure there'll be a thread here .. they had a "no go" last week that was overidden .. prayers for a safe flight.
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06:30 p.m., 06/21/06, Update: O'Connor, Scolese oppose launch on technical grounds but don't object to flight; Gerstenmaier says flight is first with system classified as posing 'unacceptable risk'
NASA's top safety official and the agency's chief engineer said today they opposed the shuttle Discovery's launch July 1 because of concern about so-called ice-frost ramps on the ship's external tank that could shed foam and cause catastrophic impact damage. In fact, Discovery's flight will be the first in shuttle history with a system formally classified in the "unacceptable risk" category.
Bryan O'Connor, director of Safety and Mission Assurance at NASA headquarters in Washington, and Chris Scolese, the agency's chief engineer, both declined to concur with the decision to launch when signing an official Certificate of Flight Readiness, or CoFR, following a flight readiness review that ended Saturday.
But both men said today they viewed the issue as a threat to the vehicle - not a direct threat to the crew - and as such, they accepted NASA Administrator Mike Griffin's decision to press ahead with launch.
Griffin's decision raised concern in some quarters that NASA might not be paying enough attention to two of its top officials and repeating at least some of the management miscues that led to the 2003 Columbia disaster.
But Griffin and other senior managers insisted that was not the case and that O'Connor and Scolese presented their arguments in great detail and accepted the administrator's decision. In fact, when signing the CoFR document, both men wrote in by hand that they were officially no-go for launch but, since the issue did not threaten the crew, they did not object to proceeding with the flight.
O'Connor today acknowledged a perception problem with the seemingly contradictory positions, but said it was the result of the flight readiness review process and the engineering community's classification of the ice-frost ramps as "probable/catastrophic" in NASA's integrated risk matrix.
"When this first came up, most folks were pretty concernd about it," he said. "That concern level has been going down as we learn more about it, as we refine the models, we look at the data. We haven't changed the design, but there's a little bit of a shift toward more comfort than the other direction.
"I think we're just barely into the unacceptable risk area. I think it's unacceptable to the program to go fly in this condition. But I also believe if it's elevated to the right authority, an administrator (Griffin) who looks at it and with his understanding and his position in the agency who can accept it, then I felt like I was not going to lie down in the flame trench or throw my badge down."
But for purposes of the certification of flight readiness, "I was no go. Period," O'Connor said. "Now there's a second (hand-written) statement that says something to the effect that given this technical issue has already been elevated to the agency (Griffin) level and the risk has been accepted at the appropriate level by the agency as opposed to the program, I do not plan to appeal that.
"The reason that's a little strange is normally, if you just follow the rule book on how you have these reviews, you'd have your review and if there were a dissent there, then you'd have to go have another review to elevate it to agency level.
The administrator attended the review, he was the appeal level, he attended it and we discussed this issue the day before we all signed the CoFR statements. We got his acceptance of the risk formally, right there in the review. That's why I put two statements in there."
Said Scolese: "When it all came out, the view of myself was no-go for the flight because I believe we should repair it. But given the decision, and given the fact that we do have many options available to us to protect the crew - and the orbiter if we can effect a repair - the (engineering) community is not against the decision to fly."
A Brad Bump!!! ;)