STS-114 Astronaut Charles Camarda removed from leading the MMT

On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 13:54:14 +0000, Henry Spencer wrote:

In article , Craig Fink
wrote:

Anyway why would an astronaut
back out? His statistical risk for just one flight isn't all that high.

It might well worry him all the same...

Risk/Reward

From the astronauts perspective, his current risk of dying on the flight
is only 2.6% (3/115), which would most likely be the Shuttle final
statistics. I agree 2.6% is something to worry about, but the reward is
also high. Especially, for rookie astronauts were the reward part of the
equation is much higher than for veteran who has flown many times. It's
understandable why Eliena Collens chose to resign. After having survived a
7% (4*2/114) risk during her career at NASA, the incremental reward for a
fifth flight is much less while carrying the same 2.6% risk.

http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/collins.html

but there is powerful social
pressure not to chicken out at the last minute and leave your buddies in
the lurch. (This is the same thing that keeps most soldiers in
combat... which is why it's extremely important that soldiers train
together before going into combat together, to form those buddy
relationships.)


Hopefully, they've looked at their personal risk/reward ratio and made
their decision and stick to it. But, even at this late date, with
decisions going on at NASA like the firing (reassignment) of Charles
Camarda, I would think they all have or are reevaluating their own
personal risk/reward ratio. It would be understandable if they came to a
different conclusion. I would think that NASA's at risk of losing a
veteran astronaut more than a rookie.

--
Craig Fink
Courtesy E-Mail Welcome @

Astronaut Charles Camarda still working this mission on the MMT.

http://www.ny1.com/ny1/content/index...id=1&aid=60634

--
Craig Fink
Courtesy E-Mail Welcome @

On 29 Jun 2006 19:15:47 -0700, in a place far, far away,
" made the phosphor on
my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

Sorry, looks like I was wrong:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/0....ap/index.html

Rand Simberg wrote:
On 28 Jun 2006 17:23:32 -0700, in a place far, far away,
" made the phosphor on
my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

The odds are now better than one in 50 chance of catastrophic failure
because we have made the craft safer

Where in the world did *this* number come from?

And you think that CNN knows what they're talking about?

Does anybody really know ?? All we can be is hopeful.



Rand Simberg wrote:
On 29 Jun 2006 19:15:47 -0700, in a place far, far away,
" made the phosphor on
my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

Sorry, looks like I was wrong:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/0....ap/index.html

Rand Simberg wrote:
On 28 Jun 2006 17:23:32 -0700, in a place far, far away,
" made the phosphor on
my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

The odds are now better than one in 50 chance of catastrophic failure
because we have made the craft safer

Where in the world did *this* number come from?

And you think that CNN knows what they're talking about?

On Fri, 30 Jun 2006 02:31:36 +0000, Rand Simberg wrote:

On 29 Jun 2006 19:15:47 -0700, in a place far, far away,
" made the phosphor on
my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

Sorry, looks like I was wrong:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/0....ap/index.html

Rand Simberg wrote:
On 28 Jun 2006 17:23:32 -0700, in a place far, far away,
" made the phosphor on
my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

The odds are now better than one in 50 chance of catastrophic failure
because we have made the craft safer

Where in the world did *this* number come from?

And you think that CNN knows what they're talking about?

Well, it Certainly Not News.

--
Craig Fink
Courtesy E-Mail Welcome @

wrote:
Sorry, looks like I was wrong:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/0....ap/index.html






Am I the only one who finds the headline to that article sick?

Not to mention I'm wondering where the heck this number comes from:

"Humans have gone into space 717 times"

I'll be 717 humans flying into space...but we're nowhere near 717
flights...

-A.L.

The 2nd test flight after the death of a crew, should not be utilized
as part of operational mission, but utilized to improve the safety of
manned missions. Nasa's push for testing to verify shuttle operative
abilities is documented throughout the program, but many of the
orbiters flight dynamics are still just being understood. All flight
testing must remain with in the safe margins, and without a
quantitative risk assessment (qra) that has been updated with:
reductions of safety margins, failures, anomalies, problems, and
corrective actions throughout the orbiters lifetime, and centers,
stated risks do not reflect reality.
To the concern of the "aviators" astronauts compiling a complete
updated database for the orbiter systems has been a problem for nasa
(ASAP dec 2005), as there are many places or centers involved with
program making correlation for cause of problematic failures or
anomalies much harder, reducing the chances safety will be improved.
The many nasa centers information data bases have differences amongst
the way they gather, handle and produce the information for space
shuttle operations. This uniqueness amongst the centers databases makes
a complete compiling and correlation impossible, as variables
dependencies cannot be established when analyzing the data. The
problem for not being able to establish variable dependencies in risk
analysis is a clear connection between failure modes cannot be
determined, and therefore makes a complete qra impossible. Without a
complete space shuttle program qra, nasa has not updated the space
shuttle programs risk assessment to reflect reality. In addition
utilizing the iss as a safety margin for the shuttles ascent, does not
reduce the risks for shuttle mission failure, for the iss has not had a
full qra as well, and therefore damaged orbiter/iss docking failure
risks will not reflect reality either.
Managers decisions to push the orbiter system to perform an operational
flight (7th heaviest mission executing a performance enhanced ascent),
while conducting the 2nd flight test (pal ramps, bipod wedge, modified
ascent software) after death of a crew, without a full qra, to better
understand the risks of the sts-121 mission is a test of Murphy's
law.

ASAP
Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel December 2005
Page 18, 19
STANDARDIZATION
Mr. Marshall stated that the ASAP is not trying to deny center
individuality. NASA
has some standardization, but the agency is missing an opportunity to
leverage
wonderful pro grams that are ongoing at centers - there continues to
be a need to
do this. General Gideon felt that the standardization requests seem to
come fro m
the aviators. He agreed that while there is uniqueness in NASA, t h e
re is a greater need for standardization. Mr.Williams expressed
sensitivity to the different abilities
of the centers, but noted that, when these unique abilities are not
share d , an
opportunity is lost. Dr. Esogbue added that while centers can be
creative and different,
minimum standards must be maintained. Admiral Dyer remarked that there
are things at individual centers that absolutely sparkle, and that he
was excited
about taking good ideas from one center and sharing it with others.
NASA appears
to have some aspects of the Articles of Confederation in its
center-splintered
culture. Dr. Esogbue stated that NASA has embraced the "Lessons
Learned "
concept; thus, standardization of the better lessons learned from the
"sparkling"
centers, should be an extension of the concept.

Craig Fink wrote:
On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 13:54:14 +0000, Henry Spencer wrote:

In article , Craig Fink
wrote:

Anyway why would an astronaut
back out? His statistical risk for just one flight isn't all that high.

It might well worry him all the same...

Risk/Reward

From the astronauts perspective, his current risk of dying on the flight
is only 2.6% (3/115), which would most likely be the Shuttle final
statistics. I agree 2.6% is something to worry about, but the reward is
also high. Especially, for rookie astronauts were the reward part of the
equation is much higher than for veteran who has flown many times. It's
understandable why Eliena Collens chose to resign. After having survived a
7% (4*2/114) risk during her career at NASA, the incremental reward for a
fifth flight is much less while carrying the same 2.6% risk.

http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/collins.html

but there is powerful social
pressure not to chicken out at the last minute and leave your buddies in
the lurch. (This is the same thing that keeps most soldiers in
combat... which is why it's extremely important that soldiers train
together before going into combat together, to form those buddy
relationships.)


Hopefully, they've looked at their personal risk/reward ratio and made
their decision and stick to it. But, even at this late date, with
decisions going on at NASA like the firing (reassignment) of Charles
Camarda, I would think they all have or are reevaluating their own
personal risk/reward ratio. It would be understandable if they came to a
different conclusion. I would think that NASA's at risk of losing a
veteran astronaut more than a rookie.

--
Craig Fink
Courtesy E-Mail Welcome @

On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 19:05:06 -0500, Jorge R. Frank wrote
(in article ):

Herb Schaltegger wrote in
.com:

On Wed, 28 Jun 2006 08:54:14 -0500, Henry Spencer wrote
(in article ):

In article , Craig Fink
wrote:
Now we need just ONE astronaut to back out due to family
pressure...

No, I believe NASA usually has backup astronauts ready to go.

Not any more. NASA long ago stopped naming complete backup crews,
because they were so rarely needed. On complex missions, they did
occasionally add one backup mission specialist, and non-NASA
crewmembers typically did have backups so NASA wouldn't have to delay
a flight if one of them broke a leg. But nowadays, if somebody gets
sick you just delay the flight, and more drastic problems late in
training have been so rare that it hasn't been worth

major precautions against them.

Well, Expedition 13 has a complete backup crew.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/st...pedition13/ind
e x.html

Do I get a shirt? :-p

Could be. Henry didn't qualify his statement by saying that NASA doesn't name

*shuttle* backup crews. ISS is another matter, of course.

Okay, Henry's had almost 24 hours to try to retroactively issue weasel
words or some other kind of disclaimer.

I claim a t-shirt! :-D

--
Herb

"Everything is controlled by a small evil group to which,
unfortunately, no one we know belongs."
~Anonymous

Herb Schaltegger wrote:

Okay, Henry's had almost 24 hours to try to retroactively issue weasel
words or some other kind of disclaimer.

I claim a t-shirt! :-D


Cut to image of the black-clad Herb and bearded Henry facing each other:
"Your powers are weak, old man..."
Herb raises his lawbook, and strikes Henry down....but Henry's T-shirt
is empty!
Meanwhile, up on Dagobah, Rusty is instructing his new group of recruits:
"Learn this you must; great is the power of the .pdf, but use it not for
the wrong ends, or it will destroy you.
Space battleships? A Deep Space Bombardment Force? A Spaceranger craves
not these things."

Pat

On Fri, 30 Jun 2006 19:42:22 -0500, Pat Flannery wrote
(in article ):



Herb Schaltegger wrote:

Okay, Henry's had almost 24 hours to try to retroactively issue weasel
words or some other kind of disclaimer.

I claim a t-shirt! :-D


Cut to image of the black-clad Herb and bearded Henry facing each other:
"Your powers are weak, old man..."
Herb raises his lawbook, and strikes Henry down....but Henry's T-shirt
is empty!
Meanwhile, up on Dagobah, Rusty is instructing his new group of recruits:
"Learn this you must; great is the power of the .pdf, but use it not for
the wrong ends, or it will destroy you.
Space battleships? A Deep Space Bombardment Force? A Spaceranger craves
not these things."

Pat

One of your finer works, Patrick. Quoted in its entirety for the
benefit of future generations . . . ;-)

--
Herb

"Everything is controlled by a small evil group to which,
unfortunately, no one we know belongs."
~Anonymous