The Space Shuttle Challenger.....

Jan 28, 2016 - (Article date) The night before the launch, Ebeling and four other engineers at NASA contractor Morton Thiokol had tried to stop the launch. Their managers and NASA overruled them.

Why weren't the managers of NASA charged with manslaughter and sent to jail?

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Comments (41)

Hello,

There are so many cases you could have the same remarks on but does it help? NO
Why the strongest always wins!!
Here it was the NASA, an organsation representing the american dream! So back off!!
They will never admit their mistakes!!
Why did they overruled it? Was it snobbery? arrogancy?......?? No one will ever know it.
But 7 young people lost their life for it! May they rest in peace!
Was it worth it all?? I doubt it. I call it science of stupidity.
@ PC - wave So you think if an organization is powerful enough it has the right to murder people and get away with it ..?

Now I'm not saying that NASA should be disbanded but the managers responsible should have been sent to jail and new managers should have been appointed forthwith.

.... grin wine
Hans

"You Might Have Your Dates Wrong"

"I Believe"

"That Happened Back In The Mid Eighties"

"If Im Correct".......................detective
"With The Picture Of The Crew Youre Showing?"

"That Was In 1986"....................detective
@ Nam~ - The date was when the article was written..... I copied it along with the source code but the code didn't show up in here... conversing


..... grin cheers
"Oh Okay"

"Id Have Preferred To Have Told you In Email"

"But That....Was Blocked"


"I Think There Was Another Too"

"If I Remember Correctly"

"It Had Blown Apart Over Palestine Texas".....................detective
@ Nam~ - Sorry I wasn't aware that any countries were blocked in my PM, must have happened when CS changed it's format. I'll fix that post-haste...... wow


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@ Nam~ - PM settings have been fixed... it allowed PM's from north and south but not central..... dunno



Is that clip from the Texas failure...?


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"No"

Its The Take Off From 1986"..........................detective
@ Nam~ - It doesn't look like a space shuttle launch, rather like a single missile.... conversing


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"Heres Another Shot"

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@ Nam~ - Yep that's more like it...... thumbs up


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The crew pictured is that of the Challenger, that blew up when an O ring on a solid rocket booster leaked and ignited the central fuel tank. The first video showing a detonation is an SRB being intentionally detonated to prevent further accident. The second video is that of the Challenger exploding.

The second Shuttle disaster occurred because a piece of insulation hit the body of the orbiter upon liftoff and damaged the insulating tiles. That's the one where a trail of sparks and flame was traced halfway across the country upon reentry.
"The Challenger Crew"............................................"Walking Into History"...(January 28th...1986)

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I think perhaps because of the billions of dollars involved, and because the element of risk was always insanely high. Did the families of the dead astronauts sue? If the risk was not only higher than usual but the contractors had said so and tried to stop the launch, it does sound very like manslaughter.
@ xqu~ - wave Thank you for that information, I was quite sure the 1st clip was not that of a space shuttle and yes my main article is about the 'O' ring failure on the Challenger and why no-one was held accountable for its demise after being warned it would fail in cold weather be engineers who built it ..... conversing


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@ Nan~ - ...... thumbs up


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@ Elegsabiff - The engineers of the contracting business had proof of a previous booster rocket test that showed that the 'O' rings would shrink in cold weather and cause exhaust gases to escape past and melt the seal. With this proof in hand they pleaded with the management of NASA not to launch but they went ahead anyway..... This information was brought to light at the inquest but still no-one was charged with manslaughter...... very mad


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Hi Hans, yes and thanks for the information from que. I remember both shuttle disasters very sad times in our Country.

I agree that was not the Challenger in the first video.
@ Wen~ - wave ... Thank you for you comment and yes very sad indeed made worse by that fact that it need not have happened in the first place..... crying


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Xqu, sorry for spelling your name till after I posted and caught it. Very good and important message you shared. thumbs up
The reason why they weren't jailed is because there were no chargers, or trial where they were found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

Innocent until proven guilty.

The reason why no charges were filed would be to do with the outcome of any investigation.

Your questions should be about the investigation(s).

Who carried out the investigation(s)?

Were they impartial?

What were the outcomes?

Are there circumstances within the investigation(s) which might warrant charges?

Could enough evidence be found to lead to trial?

If there is no record of the recommendation to postpone the launch, other than eye witness testimony, is that enough to bring people to trial?
@ Jac~ - See my last reply to Elegsabiff....... They had physical proof from the last booster rocket test.

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Very good question Hans and I totally agree with you as too why were they not prosecuted, they know it was reque.
I wonder how they feel about their decision today? wave Jenny
@ British~ - wave ... They are probably still counting their lucky stars that they are still free men....... roll eyes


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No problem. No sweat about misspellings of my handle. It's an odd one, and derived (I believe) from the name of some decades-old software. I just thought it was kinda cool.

Most likely, no charges were filed and no lawsuits levied because space flight (then, and still, probably, now) is a "fly at your own risk" proposition. Neil Armstrong, the first man on the moon, was originally a test pilot for YEARS before flying in an Apollo craft. All American astronauts were/are well trained, well educated, and quite intelligent. The sole exception to this would be Christa McAuliffe, the elementary school teacher who died in the Challenger disaster. Apparently, space flight had become so much an every day, humdrum occurrence that President Reagan designated teachers as the next candidates to fly in the shuttles, so that they could spread the word about America's success. But, as we saw with Apollo 1 and Apollo 13, nothing is for sure.
Hans, thanks for posting this blog... I'm curious about what happened.
Certainly I remember getting a phone call at work telling me about the tragedy and to turn on the radio. We didn't have a TV in the office and it was before streaming video via internet.

I see there are several YouTube videos on the subject.

I'm linking one here that could be of interest. Watching it now...

Challenger Space Shuttle - The Untold Story
@ xqu~ & Viking - Agreed with anything new like space flight there will always be a chance for something to go wrong but when the engineers of the rocket boosters show you proof and tell you that the 'O' rings WILL fail in cold weather and you still force a launch then you are guilty of manslaughter, no if's or but's about it.... professor


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...thats true Hans...cheers
@ Viking - thumbs up ... The night before the launch the engineers that designed the booster rockets pleaded with NASA management to not let the launch go ahead but their pleas fell on deaf ears....... mumbling very mad


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Hans, I'm not saying charges shouldn't have been brought. I'm not saying that an organisation like NASA can't get away with murder.

It's very easy to say, "That's terrible and someone should pay". It's not so easy to take a lot of evidence and find a way of bringing legal recourse.

If it were that easy, court cases would only last a few minutes.

I'm saying, outrage is not enough to convict people, nor is a single piece of evidence.
@ Jac~ - wave I'm hearing you Girl but I do think that they got off too easy under the circumstances...... mumbling blues


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In my experience, managers are often too removed from the front line to understand many things.

Maybe the hierarchical structure had it's weak points.

If someone is acting in good faith using the resources available to them (including their own skills), how culpable are they?

The trouble with outrage is that it seeks retribution. What function does retribution have? it maybe satisfies our outrage.

Surely, it would be far better to look at what went wrong and try to institute a structure with better safe-guarding?

I'd be more interested in improvement, than seeing more people suffer for a mistake. Remember, each person who goes to prison has family and friends who will be affected - they will receive the punishment too.

People who lose loved ones disastrously, so often take action, like getting laws changed, because they don't want other families to experience their pain. It's a much more positive grieving and healing process on many levels, than retribution. Achieving positive change is also perhaps a more accurate form of justice than causing others to suffer.

Unless you can demonstrate a wilful neglect of some sort, it's better to focus on learning. The rationale you've provided so far doesn't demonstrate wilful neglect: any intent is assumed by a leap of logic.
The Shuttle shouldn't have been launched that day!
The O-Ring-Erosion was considered an acceptable Flight-risk!wow

Hans, here's the short story:

The original design had one-piece rocket engines that could have been brought in by barge if the manufacturer was near a port. The low bidder awarded the contract wasn't close to a seaport so the engines were redesigned as smaller interlocking components, brought in by rail cars, hence the need for O-rings where the parts joined.

For safety, there were 2 rows of O-rings.

The O-rings weren't designed for or fully tested in freezing temperatures (which makes no sense to me) and the engineer in charge made it clear to management that previous tests showed the first row O-ring had failed. His concern was brought up several times.

The mission had been postponed several times and and the decision was swayed to allow it to proceed.
@ Jac~ - Willful neglect was demonstrated at the inquest when Morton Thiokol's engineers provided photos of previous booster rocket 'O' ring failure in cold climate that they had previously shown to the management at NASA when they pleaded with them to not launch but were blatantly overruled.... sigh

After reading the article from xqu~ it appears that in the US of A if you murder someone then pay the family a million dollars you get off scott-free, not only that but if you fired the gun you could get the gun manufacturer to pay up to 60% of the settlement...... roll eyes

Isn't this a wonderful world we live in...... explains why the lady is blindfolded

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@ Conrad~ - wave I agree with you that the shuttle should never have been launched but when the 'O' ring seals used in the joint that were not designed to handle the unusually cold conditions that existed at this launch can be considered as 'acceptable flight risk' is beyond me...... roll eyes sigh


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At this point I will close this post as I doubt any further developments will take place about this case. My view on the matter can be summed up by my last response to Jac~ comment......
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Hans4711

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