Re: GO FEVER IS WELL ENTRENTCHED:(

http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060326/NEWS02/603260313/1007/news02

Groups reported schedule concerns

BY JOHN KELLY
FLORIDA TODAY MULTIMEDIA

NASA's decision to clear shuttle Discovery for last July's return to
flight raised questions for independent reviewers inside and outside
the space agency.

Here's a look at outside reviews that FLORIDA TODAY consulted in
studying the Discovery launch decision and the space agency's handling
of the foam debris problem.

In addition to those noted below, the newspaper examined post-flight
inspection documents, reports to program managers and minutes from
shuttle-safety review panel meetings, some of which were obtained under
the Freedom of Information Act. Tiger Team October 2005 reportAfter the
loss of big pieces of foam from Discovery's external tank, NASA
assigned multiple teams to look into the cause, the decisions made
before flight and what needed to be done to make the foam safer.

The lead group was called the External Tank Tiger Team. It included
leaders from the NASA Engineering and Safety Center as well as
astronaut Don Pettit. They issued a report in October outlining what
went wrong.

The technical cause of the largest piece of foam that came off (from
the Protuberance Air Load ramp) was cracks NASA thinks formed during
repeated filling and draining of supercold propellants.

The Tiger Team noted a lack of rigorous analysis prior to key decisions
to modify or not modify parts of the tank's foam insulation. The team
said it found evidence schedule pressure played a role.

It reported that some engineers disagreed with managers' decision not
to remove and replace the suspect PAL ramp foam using a new, improved
process the space agency believed made foam less likely to break off.
The engineers were overruled. Return To Flight Task Group August 2005
minority reportNASA picked a team of astronauts, spaceflight experts
and safety gurus from a wide variety of industries to monitor the
agency's progress on the recommendations of the Columbia Accident
Investigation Board.

The Stafford-Covey Return To Flight Task Group attended internal
meetings and simulations, and met to get status reports from managers
about various safety improvements.

In the end, the panel found NASA met most of the investigators'
recommendations and did its best to meet others, including reducing
dangerous launch debris.

Seven members signed an addendum some called a "minority report." The
dissenters included veteran space engineers, astronaut and future
commander of the 45th Space Wing Col. Susan Helms and former director
of the Congressional Budget Office Dan Crippen.

They, too, saw schedule pressure driving decisions. They said better
safety fixes might have been chosen if managers were not always facing
an artificial launch date just weeks or months away.

The group faulted NASA's review of foam and ice debris. It said that
when the external tank did not meet new safety requirements for debris,
managers changed the rules of the analysis. Even then, some parts of
the tank did not meet the safety requirements.

The minority group questioned whether NASA's shipment of a redesigned
external tank to the launch site before the analyses were complete
played a role. They said that the agency was reluctant to make more
changes to a tank already on hand. NESC Peer Review Summer 2005The new
Safety Center reviewed the space agency's methods for analyzing whether
enough had been done to prevent large pieces of foam and ice from
popping off the external tanks in flight and hitting the delicate
orbiter heat-shielding materials.

In the end, NESC leaders agreed with NASA's "flight rationale."
However, they noted several concerns, including serious limitations in
the methods used to study the potential dangers posed by ice debris.

.

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