Columbia’s Final Mission

Section-C Group 10
ALISHA SURABHI PGP/PGDM/0157/55

GOYAL SAHIL PGP/PGDM/0173/55

KUMAR SUMIT PGP/PGDM/0180/55

SHUBHAM PRIYADARSHI PGP/PGDM/0214/55

TARANGA DATTA FP/12/18

SAMIR BISWAS FP/13/18

Q1. How would you characterize the culture of NASA? What are its strengths and
weaknesses?
In 1958 the U.S Congress and President Eisenhower created the NASA to launch of the
satellite Sputnik by the Soviet Union the previous year. As per the by presidents science
advisory committee in 1960, it was a race for the conquest of outer space.
NASA launched several major programs during its first two decades including aeronautics
research projects, scientific probes to the moon and other planets and was committed to
putting a man into orbit and wanted to be the ahead in the world.
NASA work culture directed towards their technical expertise and regimented culture,
guided by strict by the book guidelines and protocols. The major stakeholders of the
organization are Engineers and managers. Engineers had the in-depth knowledge of their
technicality and rocket science whereas, managers were more task-oriented and focused
upon delivering the objective of the program.
Strengths
Focusing on the organizational strength of NASA, the organization runs on the belief of “can-
do” attitude. Technical expertise is what the greatest asset of NASA’s which lead the
organization to build the legacy of technologically advanced and stand out in comparison to
the other counterparts. NASA is extremely bureaucratic. It lays out the regimented culture
for organizational hierarchy and schedule efficiency. For example, President Nixon directed
NASA to build the system of space vehicle that can repeatedly shuttle from Earth to orbit
and back and emphasized to revolutionized the transportation into space by routinizing it.
Despite of tight budget constraints, they were able to pull off the challenge and delivered
the objective. Then in 1984, following the fourth Shuttle mission, President Reagan threw
another challenge to NASA to develop economical and routine access to space for scientific
exploration, commercial ventures, and National Security related task. Despite immense
pressure from the Congress, NASA delivered the goal because of her regimented approach
and problem-solving skills which make them successful in most of their missions.
Weaknesses
The strengths mentioned above play a critical role in shaping NASA’s organizational culture
but it was very static, it hadn’t changed in a long time. They were still following the
protocols and guidelines during the crisis. Engineers don't have autonomy to communicate
information due to the rigid organizational structure. For example, former NASA engineer
Torarie Durden described the culture as “hard to navigate” and therefore he believed that
as an engineer, he faced difficulty to speak go against the regimented organizational culture.
According to Rocha “engineers were often told not to send messages much higher than
their own rung in the ladder”.
From the case, it was also evident that NASA places more trust in that of its business
managers than in it’s engineers, who were the key stakeholders of the space program.
Q2. How did the history of the space shuttle program shape people’s behavior during the
first eight days of the mission?
Day People’s Behavior as shaped by space shuttle program History

1 Although the criticality rate was high for shuttle flights pertaining to the O-ring
problem, it was an acceptable risk which they perceived as lowering their
standards doing it over and over again since the risk was not so high at the first
 place.
This perception prevailed on day 1 as even after knowing that the foam size
was comparatively unusually high, managers struck down that because it was
of low concern. The team was classified as DAT instead of Tiger team with no
clear structure to support the team following lack of communication between
engineers and managers.

2,3,4 Going further, engineers were not keen on consulting with more experienced
engineers with prior experience as such they discounted the data which could
have led to possible risks. Further, there was no answer from the inspection
team and hence had a loose analysis leading to an inability to draw the
conclusion.

5 There was lack of cooperation among the employees and they did not feel that
they were responsible and hold the authority of leading the project as such
when they were directed to meet daily they met only five times out of total 15
days. The problems defined were considered more reasonable and important
than the foam hitting the Orbiter. A specific problem was unconsidered. Rocha
was asked to seek new imagery but she was requested to do this through
engineering division rather than following the relevant path of Shuttle
Program’s chain of command. This further delayed her request for outside
agency assistance, which was not accepted readily.

6 This day showed the extremely bureaucratic and hard to navigate culture
followed and propagated in NASA where engineers were not allowed to send
messages or show their concerns to the top tier management team. Hence
their inputs were not taken into account while making decisions. The structure
was not followed by the lower hierarchies as they could not prove the requests
or requirements. On the other hand, everything was very rule-oriented and
protocol-oriented that even after knowing the importance of imagery, it was
canceled on the basis of not following the structures.

7 Remarks which came from the Schomburg’s clearly states the decision were
made on the basis of past situations and the managers lack technical
competency. Also, an email reminded the military officials that all requests had
to follow the proper channels otherwise it could slip through the system. This
email clearly indicated that NASA was more concerned about the
organizational communication channel through the official route even in the
crisis situation.

8 DAT’s findings were presented to MER manager McCormack. Five impact

scenarios based on Crater were used which predicted threat to Columbia for
reentry, one scenario was left to run. McCormack communicated this to Ham,
who was more oriented towards sticking to the schedule and not about the
safety of the astronauts.
Q3(a) How do you characterize NASA’s response to the foam strike in comparison with its
response to the Apollo 13 incident?
During the Apollo 13 mission in April-1970, the timely and innovative reaction to the
emergency situation had enabled NASA to avoid the potential catastrophe narrowly. As
soon as the problem, i.e., bursting of a primary oxygen tank, had been detected in the
spacecraft, the astronauts immediately informed the Control Base about the incident. Flight
Director Gene Kranz had responded to the situation by forming an expert group ‘Tiger
Team’ who were trained through drills and practices. They were allowed to analyze the
different possible alternatives in a creative way. The analysis enabled them to take a simple
yet important decision to provide a way of safe return of the crew. The agility and the
planning developed by the Control Base and its implementation in a novel way had proved
to be an efficient solution to save the life of the people and the mission.
However, NASA had failed to respond to the issues of the foam debris with the same
propensity as in the case of the Apollo 13 mission. Initially, NASA had considered foam
debris as one of the important factors to hamper on-board safety and devised TPS (Thermal
Protection System) to withstand minor impacts made by foam debris. TPS had performed
well, and the foam debris had never penetrated RCC panels of the system. As a result, NASA
had become somewhat complacent towards the foam-debris problem in spite of the
repeated concerns raised by the Roger’s Commission regarding NASA’s safety measures.
As foam debris did not cause such problems and the missions had completed without any
issue, the foam-debris problem had become a routine issue which was once considered as a
serious threat to the mission. As a result, foam debris issue had lost its criticality and has
considered as ‘in-flight-anomaly’ which should resolve before next flight or else as it had lost
its importance to perceive as a serious threat to the lives of the crew. So there were no such
measures to discover a way to prevent the loss of foam or to determine the root-cause of
the issue.
With the passage of time, NASA has lessened the foam debris issue which has been
categorized to a much lower risk of ‘accepted flight risk’ from in-flight anomaly status. Even
the problems in Atlantis Mission (STS-112) in Oct-2002 had failed to attract the proper
attention of the agency.
As NASA has failed to recognize the potential threat of the issue and has not bothered to
give proper attention, the consequence was disastrous in the Columbia (STS-107) mission
with the loss of lives of all the on-board crews and devastating end of the mission. Had the
NASA shown the same agility and innovative reaction to the problem as in rescuing Apollo
13 mission, the fate of the Columbia Crew would not be so tragic and they may have done
more services to the humanity possibly even today.
Q3(b) How does the Columbia mission compare to Challenger incident in 1986?

• Underestimated the risk involved in both situations

• Even though they were aware of technological glitches, like falling of foam in case of
Columbia and unsolved problems with rubber O Rings like functionality failures at
 low-temperature ranges(including leaking and erosion), they still went ahead with
the mission.
• Engineer’s technical expertise was ignored by the managers.The mission was given a
green signal even after engineers’ showing reluctance and expressing doubt over
system performance in both cases.
• Engineers not provided with suitable resources in Columbia case even after
repeatedly asking for imaging and in challenger case even engineer Roger Boisjoly
warned of catastrophic consequences, the limited and ambiguous data were not
convincing enough for others to believe that SRBs were unsafe at low temperatures.
• Engineers were not assertive enough and hence they couldn't convince their
supervisors to put the mission on hold till they were not sure of its performance in
varied conditions.
• The investigation reports pointed out that both the disasters could have been
avoided if the management was more careful about giving approvals for the mission.

Q4. What differences did you perceive in the behavior of managers versus engineers?

Basis/Incident Managers Engineers

The Challenger Look for factual proofs before making Rojer Boisjoly – Used logical arguments
Disaster decisions. and knowledge to present his point.

Columbia accident Managers in Mission evaluation NASA engineer - Rodney Rocha became
investigation - The rooms entered in their log that the worried as he recalls - gasping loudly
digitized clip strike was of low concern

Communication Rocha communicated directly to the Dittemore responded indirectly via

JSC regarding the possibility of a media that spacewalk was more
spacewalk. feasible.

Accountability `Decision was taken on the basis of
uncertainties which were confirmed
over email by JSC engineers to Ham.
When Rocha approached Shack about
the choice that was made by the
management about not making efforts
to obtain images, he was not bothered
After the first meeting of DAT, they
agreed on getting additional visual data
on the basis of their engineering
expertise. Rocha tried multiple times to
request for the need of visual data but
was delayed as the managers were
thinking that foam strikes were normal
 to explain the rationale behind the
decision.
Attitude towards Managers Ham and Dittemore from
the Problem time to time say that the foam was not
a factor as they could not do much
about it, or that the flight rationale
was lousy.
Focus Managers were mission oriented. They
wanted to meet the deadlines of
NODE 2 and avoid the scrutiny being
faced by Space station program. This
led them to be negligent towards
problems at hand
Following the chain Managers were the rule-oriented and
of command protocol-oriented. Ham canceled the
requests because she could not find
who needed imager1y. She only
contacted the MMT i.e. followed the
chain of command
Day 5 and 6 Managers, for example, Ham was
known for her domineering
management style. She was more
assertive regarding executing a task
things. This instance showed the
accountability of the engineers.
The engineers were focussed on
researching and presenting their results
to the MMT. Their attitude can be
perceived serious towards the issue
Engineers were more focussed on the
problems at hand. They were task -
oriented. They focussed on performing
the tasks they were assigned.
Engineers were more focused on finding
the fastest way by communicating with
the appropriate person who could get
the task done as soon as possible
instead of following the chain of
command.
Rocha wrote an email to address the
issue of additional imaging help from
any outside source, but she didn't send
the mail to her supervisor. They were
not to message higher authority. This
shows that they don't have the liberty
to assert a decision which was purely
related to technical expertise.