Word: boosterism
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Earlier in the week, addressing a problem that must be solved before any shuttle can fly, NASA tentatively selected a $500 million redesign for the shuttle's solid-fuel booster, the rocket responsible for the disaster. "We have taken every step to understand what failed on the Challenger and to incorporate a design that won't allow that to happen again," said John Thomas, who headed the modification effort at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center. Formal adoption, which might take months, will hinge on exhaustive tests by both the agency and booster contractor Morton Thiokol...
Investigators say the accident occurred when ajoint in a solid rocket booster failed and causedsuperheated gases to burn through the externalfuel tank containing liquid hydrogen and liquidoxygen, triggering the explosion...
...concern for human life . . . and some very bewildering thought processes" by NASA officials. Last week her feelings became even clearer. It was learned that she had filed a suit seeking $15.1 million from the space agency, specifically naming Lawrence Mulloy, who was then chief of the faulty solid-rocket-booster program. He had argued more forcefully than anyone else against the warnings of others that the cold weather could jeopardize the launch...
Accusing NASA of negligence, the suit charges that its officials "knew or should have known that the segments of the right-hand solid rocket booster would not properly seal and that a catastrophic accident would likely occur." It also claims that in the seconds before flames from the leaking booster blew up the shuttle's main tank, Challenger Pilot Smith "knew of his impending death...
...nervous wreck. The stress is incredible." Observes a fellow clerk and local union official, Toni Watson: "It's a very oppressive way to work. To be plugged into that boob tube and not be able to move gets under your skin sometimes." PSA defends its system as a productivity booster and says it is no more severe than the monitoring at other airlines...