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From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Morton Thiokol
Message-ID: <1988Nov18.182613.1823@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <1988Nov4.065730.10761@utzoo.uucp> <7594@dasys1.UUCP> <1988Nov14.214139.1892@utzoo.uucp> <7734@dasys1.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 18 Nov 88 18:26:13 GMT

In article <7734@dasys1.UUCP> tneff@dasys1.UUCP (Tom Neff) writes:
>-...NASA is
>-hardly blameless for the pressure it applied, but it was Thiokol, not
>-NASA, that ultimately decided to ignore the problem...
>-Being honorable under pressure is difficult, yes.  It's ever so much
>-simpler to take the easy way out and say "I vas chust following orders".
>
>Thiokol was concurrently negotiating a contract renewal.  The pressure
>to "go along" under those circumstances is unbearable...

Et tu, Tom?  I really fear for mankind's future when damn near everybody
who discusses this issue seems to feel that Thiokol was right to go along
just because it would have been difficult and painful not to.

The trouble with having an unpopular opinion is that everybody claims you
don't understand the problem.  I understand, fully and completely, that
Thiokol was in a very awkward spot where there was great incentive to
cave in to NASA's pressure.  THAT DID NOT MAKE IT RIGHT.  Nor should it
excuse them from taking responsibility for their cowardice, and its
disastrous consequences.

The greatest tragedy of the Challenger disaster is that seven people died,
a near-irreplaceable billion-dollar orbiter was destroyed, the US manned
space program was nearly ruined... and nobody was held responsible for
it in any meaningful way.

>... Until and unless we put every contractor in
>the excruciating position Thiokol was in and compare their performance,
>I consider it unfair to single out Thiokol for not dealing well with
>improper NASA pressure.

Ah, the other Nuremberg defence (in addition to "I vas chust following
orders"):  "if I did not do it, someone else would have".  Are you claiming
that just because most contractors would behave the same way, that somehow
makes it right for Thiokol to do so?  Name one other contractor who has,
in fact as opposed to hypothesis, caused that much damage.

Actually, have no fear -- if the message we send those people is that
screwing up massively results in billions of dollars of new contracts
and no significant penalties, then there *will* be more.
-- 
Sendmail is a bug,             |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
not a feature.                 | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu