Sep 23 1999
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(New page: Former astronauts Michael J. McCulley, Vice President and Deputy Program Manager for USA, and William F. Readdy, NASA's Deputy Associate Administrator for Space Flight, testified b...)
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Former astronauts Michael J. McCulley, Vice President and Deputy Program Manager for USA, and William F. Readdy, NASA's Deputy Associate Administrator for Space Flight, testified before the U.S. House Science Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics regarding wiring damage found in Space Shuttles Columbia, Discovery, Endeavour, and Atlantis. In its first official report since discovering that frayed wires had caused the short circuit 5 seconds into Columbia's launch on 23 July, NASA informed committee members that wiring inspections and maintenance had cost US$350,000. NASA had not yet calculated the cost of the ongoing safety "stand down." NASA also indicated that it did not intend to pay USA the US$2.5 million the company would have earned if it had punctually delivered the next Shuttle scheduled for launch. McCulley had indicated that his company accepted "full responsibility for wiring damage" found in all four Shuttles, despite the fact that the wiring problems might have stemmed from maintenance conducted before USA took over operational responsibility. Committee members expressed their concern that NASA planned to request more money for the repairs, but Readdy replied that such a scenario was unlikely, because USA would be responsible for making the repairs. Committee members also were worried about whether Shuttle launches and flights could maintain adequate safety levels when the Shuttle team had only a few opportunities to practice their skills. NASA Associate Administrator for Safety and Mission Assurance Frederick D. Gregory responded that simulation launches, in combination with a flight rate of two launches per year, were sufficient to keep a launch team's skills sharp.
NASA scientists lost contact with the Mars Climate Orbiter spacecraft as it entered its Martian orbit and disappeared behind the planet, a little less than a year after the launch of its Mars mission in December 1998. Mars Surveyor Project Manager John B. McNamee said that the orbit-insertion burn, a 16-minute-long burn to slow the spacecraft down as it enters orbit, had begun on time. The team of NASA scientists observed 5 minutes of the burn before the craft went behind Mars. At that point, the craft stopped communicating. Communication did not resume at the time the team expected the craft to reappear from the far side of the planet. McNamee reported that the latest navigation results showed that the craft had entered its orbit lower than his team had planned, indicating that NASA's navigation predictions at the tracking station may have been incorrect. Carl B. Pilcher, Science Director for Solar System Exploration at NASA Headquarters, commented that, although losing the spacecraft was very serious, the loss was "not devastating to the Mars Surveyor Program as a whole," because the mission of Mars Polar Lander, scheduled to arrive at Mars two months after Mars Climate Orbiter, was independent of that of Orbiter.
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