Mar 5 1986
From The Space Library
NASA and the Nuclear Safety Review Panel differed in their estimates of the reliability of booster rockets before the January 28 accident. The interagency panel's estimate of failure was 1 in 1,000 launches as compared to NASA's 1 in 100,000 firings. The panel was created because 19 missions carrying potentially hazardous plutonium power sources (were an accident to occur within the Earth's atmosphere) involved the Shuttle. Two other nuclear powered satellites were scheduled for launches from the Shuttle later in 1986. (WSJ, Mar 5/86; C Trib, Mar 6/86)
Aerojet Solid Propulsion Company, an unsuccessful bidder on Shuttle boosters, released documents it had sent to NASA some 13 years earlier stating that the multi-segment booster that relied on o-ring seals were "burdened with design features that can detract from safe, efficient, and reliable operation." According to officials involved in the decision to choose the Utah based Thiokol design, the least expensive bid; the fact that Senator Frank Moss, then chairman of the committee that controlled NASA's budget came from Utah; and that then NASA Administrator Dr. James Fletcher was former president of the University of Utah were all salient factors. NASA calculations, however, also pointed out that Thiokol needed minimal up front Government cash and deferred major costs to the latest possible date, and that Aerojet required a good deal more money to get started. All three factors were important to the early days of the program's budget constraints. (B Sun, Mar 5/86)
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