Sacked safety experts turn on Nasa over cuts (Nasa ignored repeated warnings )

independent ^ | 2/4/2003 | Andrew Buncombe

[TLBSHOW]

Sacked safety experts turn on Nasa over cuts

Recriminations mounted yesterday after it was revealed that Nasa ignored repeated warnings about the safety of the shuttle programme from its own advisers and tried to suppress their criticisms by sacking some of them.

In the 12 months before Saturday's disaster, Nasa's Aerospace Safety Advisory Board warned several times that budget pressures meant safety upgrades and improvements were not being done. Nasa responded by firing five of the nine-member panel and another resigned in disgust.

Richard Blomberg, chairman of the panel which is made of experts from industry and academia, told Congress last April: "I have never been as worried for space shuttle safety as I am right now. All of my instincts suggest that the current approach is planting the seeds for future danger."

The revelation about the firing of the panel members has added to growing disquiet among experts and former Nasa engineers that the organisation was not doing enough to ensure the safety of its astronauts. As America continues to mourn the seven who died there are signs that the public is demanding answers about what went wrong and whether the disaster could have been avoided.

The Nasa administrator Sean O'Keefe flew to Washington yesterday to try to answer some of those questions for President George Bush, briefing him on the state of the investigation and on efforts to recover debris and human remains scattered across east Texas and Louisiana.

But as the recovery efforts continue there is growing concern that the disaster could have been avoided. Last week, the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, said Nasa faced shortages of trained staff members.

Nasa's advisory panel's most recent report, published last March, warned that work on long-term shuttle safety had "deteriorated". It said lack of funds was forcing Nasa to concentrate too much on short-term planning and ignore a series of planned improvements. The report called for sweeping changes.

In an interview with The New York Times, Seymour Himmel, one of the sacked panel members, said: "We were telling it like it was and were disagreeing with some of the agency's actions."

Senator Bill Nelson, who himself flew on a shuttle mission, has been vocal since Saturday in highlighting the need for greater funding. He pointed out that in September 2001 he told a Senate hearing into shuttle safety that budget plans for the space programme abandoned "some of the most critical safety upgrades for our ageing fleet".

Senator Kay Hutchison of Texas said she was "concerned we were diluting our mission with budget cuts".

Jose Garcia, a retired Nasa technical assistant, said budget cuts throughout the 1990s had resulted in the elimination of many safety checks during launch preparations. He went public with his concerns – even ensuring his message was received by President Clinton – but he said nothing changed.

Nasa denied it ignored safety issues. Ron Dittemore, manager of the shuttle programme, has repeatedly said that ensuring the safe return of astronauts has always been his chief concern.

A Nasa spokeswoman, Sonja Alexander, denied the the advisory panel members had been sacked because of their criticisms. She said Nasa had changed the group's charter so that "new members, younger and more skilled, could be added".

The space administration stressed its determination yesterday to do everything it could to discover what caused Columbia to tear apart just 16 minutes before it was due to land at Cape Canaveral.

[David Isaac]

There was an ex-NASA employee just on O'Reilly, who said pretty much what the other ex-employees have been saying. Who would possibly be surprised that most of the problems occurred under the watchful eye of Pres. clinton. Perhaps his watchful eyes were busy elsewhere.

[TLBSHOW]

CLINTON FOR 7 YEARS STRIGHT DID NOT FUND NASA FULLY

[Cicero]

I have a friend who does consulting for NASA on the Mars program. He says (and I agree) that the fellow clinton put in charge of NASA was a full-bore disaster.

Bush put someone far better in charge, but I'm sure that, like most of the government bureaucracies, a lot of time-serving clintonoids are still in place.

Clinton was an absolute genius at finding the very worst people in every branch of government and promoting them into positions of authority. It was one of his major preoccupations throughout his eight years in office.

[Enterprise]

It all sounds about right. People were telling NASA the truth and NASA didn't like it so they fired them and hired people who told them what they wanted to hear. Simple!

[Eagle Eye]

NASA has an ad out for a System Safety Engineer.

Any takers?

[meema]

bump

[TLBSHOW]

NEW ANALYSIS SEES SHUTTLE BREAKUP BEGINNING EARLIER... Columbia was already spinning out of control, its left wing and left maneuvering engine damaged or destroyed, in the last two seconds of data transmission... Developing Urgent...

Matt Drudge tonight

[spartan68]

The Nasa administrator Sean O'Keefe

Aye yes, another pencil pushing, textbook educated idiot that has absoutely no business being in the position he is in...

Just exactly what qualifies Mr. O'Klown for his current position??

Yea, he balanced the Nasa Books, alright, by tossing safety and common sense out the door!

[Enterprise]

The description of Shuttle's final moments is awful. It seems the Shuttle was turning left about 20 degrees per second, and for a while it may have been doing a death spiral. But NASA managers got what they wanted. They fired people who were telling them the truth, and hired younger people who were more skilled. Unfortunately, the skilled got people killed.

[TLBSHOW]

Nasa was warned and they are to blame for this mess.

This shuttle never should of gone up but it did and NASA people that ignorned the problems and fired those that warned ended up killing 7 people!

[TLBSHOW]

As soon as Nasa admits their part in this disaster and heads roll I can change my tag line. As soon as they review all problems that Don Nelson broought up and that others brought up and do something about them. I can change my tag line. 7 people died for nothing, that shuttle should never of gone up.

nasaproblems.com

updates and other stories of why this shuttle was lost and nasa new.....

March 1, 2003

Space Shuttle Columbia is gone... but has the countdown already started for a third shuttle disaster? There were two reasons for the Columbia disaster: a system failure and a management failure. We may never know the exact cause for the system failure, but the reasons for the management failures are there for all to see. Unless the Office of the President and Congress address the following management failures... then indeed, the countdown has already started for the third shuttle disaster!

NASA Management Failures and Solutions
By Don A. Nelson
Retired NASA Aerospace Engineer

Index
Two NASA’s
There are two NASA's... the old and the new. The New NASA is a series of management failures.

http://www.nasaproblems.com/

[Jael]

NEW ANALYSIS SEES SHUTTLE BREAKUP BEGINNING EARLIER... Columbia was already spinning out of control, its left wing and left maneuvering engine damaged or destroyed, in the last two seconds of data transmission... Developing Urgent... (Drudge)

[Fred Mertz]

You should know better. NASA will never admit to any mistakes.

[TLBSHOW]

Someone is going to admit a mistake, which was to not listen to warnings.