Jan 3 1986
From The Space Library
The steering problem that halted the Shuttle Columbia's launch in December of 1985 was traced to a tiny electrical component that led ground computers astray. (W Times, Jan 3/86; NY Times, Jan 3/86)
The Federal Aviation Administration has become increasingly concerned with the problem of inadequate airline maintenance. Because they maintain a 17-hour-per-day schedule and are involved in repeated takeoffs and landings, commercial jetliners are prone to numerous mechanical breakdowns. Although "modern jets are designed to fly despite even serious defects" and although U.S. carriers employ an army of airline mechanics repairing planes in between scheduled flights, several U.S. carriers were fined by the Federal Aviation Administration last summer for a "series of maintenance-related transgressions." The National Transportation Safety Board was considering whether a crash of a Midwest Express Airline jet in September 1985, in which 31 people were killed, was caused by poor maintenance. Some air-safety experts expressed fear that airline companies had become too cost conscious about safety; still, maintenance error ranked third behind pilot error and bad weather as a cause of fatal airline crashes. (WSJ, Jan 3/86)
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