NASA Astronaut on Columbia Repair (and others)

"columbiaaccidentinvestigation"
wrote:
I stated "The point of Roger Boisjoly's information and affiliation
with a group such as onlineethics.org is for all of us to benefit from
his personal story to stop the launch of challenger, and prevent the
tragedy that occurred jan 28 1986"

Derek Lyons replied "Except - he didn't actually take any actual action
to stop the launch and prevent the tragedy. When push came to shove -
he folded. His actual message seems to be "you can claim an ethical
victory even if you failed". (Or to put it even finer "it does not
matter if people died, so long as you've done the minimum to salve you
our conscience"

Interesting critique of one mans actions derek, firstly I hope you may
you never be faced with the burden Boisjoly and his colleagues have to
bear for attempting to, but not being able to stop a tragedy from
occurring,

If Boisjoly & Co. had made a serious attempt to stop the launch -
you'd have a point. But, it was work as usual. Slap up a few
viewgraphs, write a few reports, make a few phone calls.

But when push came to shove, and ethics _mattered_, they tossed their
ethics to wind and folded like a house of cards.

Now the historical account in the Rogers commission report
shows boisjoly was talking to the right people, and presenting the
correct evidence to postpone the cold weather launch of sts-51l on jan
28, 1986, but his advice was ignored by people who had the authority to
overrule him, and did.

Ethics isn't about advice - it's about standing firm and standing up.
Boisjoly & Co. did niether. Period.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL