Ethics in Engineering & Information Technology

A Brief Guide to Ethical Theories and Principles

Ethical Paper 1 · Ethical Paper 2 · Ethical Paper 4

Case Study #3:

NASA's Space Shuttle, "Challenger"

By Christopher Paul

Introduction:

On the morning of January 28, 1986, space shuttle “Challenger” exploded just 73 seconds into the launch, killing six astronauts and a civilian Christa McAuliffe, due to the failure of the primary and secondary O-rings on the solid fuel rockets allowing blow-by and a subsequent burn-through to the hydrogen filled fuel tank.

Stakeholders:

The stakeholders in this case are Ronald Regan, then President of the United States, NASA and its entire staff including upper management, the astronauts aboard space shuttle Challenger, the American citizens, Marshall Space Flight Center, Larry Mulloy, Morton Thiokol, Alan McDonald, Bob Lund, Robert Ebeling, Roger Boisjoly, Joe Kilminster, Jerald Mason.

Technical Issues:

The O-rings on the solid fuel rocket were part of a sealing mechanism between segments of the booster rockets. If the o-rings lost too much of their resiliency, they could fail altogether. The result would be the escape of hot gases, ignition of the fuel in the storage tanks, and a fatal explosion. Technical or objective evidence was incomplete and did not exist as to how low the ambient temperature could go before the O-rings would no longer perform their critical function.

NASA and Morton Thiokol (Manufacturer of the booster rockets) were both aware of the sealing problem since 1977. Test results had shown that the SRB joints would rotate at ignition, creating a larger gap between the tang and the clevis. According to NASA engineers the gap was large enough to prevent the secondary O-ring from sealing if the primary O-ring failed late in the ignition phase. Modifications were made utilizing sealing putty behind the O-rings and the joint was certified as an acceptable risk.

In November 1981, it was discovered that there was impingent erosion of the primary O-ring. The hot propellant gases had moved through the blow-by holes in the zinc chromate putty in the joints. The blowholes were caused by entrapped air introduced at the time the putty was installed. Once again, the joints were certified as an acceptable risk.

In 1984, it was found that for the first time two primary O-rings on two different joints were eroded. Again the erosion on two joints was termed an acceptable risk.

Ethical Issues:

The primary issue here was it ethical on the part of NASA to go ahead and launch space shuttle challenger knowing subjectively that because of low ambient temperatures the night before launch and the morning of the launch, that there was the possibility of critical and possible catastrophic failure of the solid propellant rockets due to improper sealing of the primary and secondary o-rings.

A secondary issue was it ethical for NASA, knowing full well that space flight is subject to tight coupling and complex interactions which inherently may lead to normal accidents, to send a civilian into space. Even considering the number of times NASA has sent a human into space there are still numerous risks associated with space flight and due to these inherent risks, astronauts are still only test flight engineers at best.

Analysis:

The problem that existed since the inception of the space shuttle program was the fault of NASA’s management to consistently lower the bar or the safety standards that were acceptable to go ahead with the launch of the space shuttle. NASA management had a great deal at stake. Throughout the political history of the space shuttle, it was becoming more and more difficult to justify the funding of the space shuttle with taxpayers dollars. The general consent within Congress and the American public as a majority were we really willing to continue funding the space program. We had already landed a man on the moon and the general consensus was do we really perceive any real economic benefit from the continuation of the space program. I.E., the belief was that the space program was in a position of diminishing returns. As a nation, we were spending huge sums of money on the space program and receiving less of a return economically on the knowledge we gained from subsequent space exploration, or in other words, knowledge for knowledge’s sake. In order to continue funding for the space flight program, NASA had to prove that space flight could be economical and had committed itself to what may and still be an unrealistic expectation of being able to perform 21 successful launches 21 times during the course of a year, safely and economically.

NASA was under tremendous pressure by the American Public and the President of the United States to perform according to its own established criteria. President Regan had also established what he called “The Star Wars Program.” The purpose of this program was in the event of an offensive nuclear strike, predominantly by the Soviets, to protect the United States by destroying the nuclear missiles before they ever re-entered into the atmosphere. Tremendous funding was available to the scientific and engineering community to create ways in which this goal could be achieved. Therefore NASA was going to do everything they could possibly do to ensure that NASA received its share of funding from the program.

On the day of the launch on January 28, President Regan scheduled to deliver his State of the Nation speech, where he amongst other issues was going to attempt to sell the funding being spent on the space shuttle program as a necessary program by talking about how great it was that was going to include a civilian schoolteacher, Christa McAuliffe, who would be giving lessons from space. This of course placed a great deal of pressure on NASA’s management to make sure that the shuttle was indeed going to launch that particular day. NASA already had enough pressure in having to prove its claim that they could meet their own objective of sending up a space shuttle 21 times out of a year. President Regan’s speech is the most likely reason, although it cannot be objectively proven, that this is the main reason why NASA’s management decided that the sealing of the O-rings of the SRB at lower temperatures was an acceptable risk. According to engineering data it was inconclusive whether the O-rings would continue to seal or not, henceforth because there was no objective data and only a subjective opinion by the Chief O-ring engineer Roger Boisjoly that the launch may be unsafe due to group think, the challenger was given the go-ahead to launch.

On the evening before the launch, January 27, a pre-launch teleconference was held between Morton Thiokol, the manufacturer of the solid fuel booster rockets and NASA’s Marshall Space Center. Chief O-ring engineer, Roger Boisjoly how was employed by Morton Thiokol, expressed his concern about the sealing of the O-rings and conveyed a recommendation of a no-launch exercising his professional engineering judgment and his professional obligation seeing to the protection of the public’s safety and health. Roger’s concerns were based on his worries about the ability of the O-rings to properly seal at low temperatures.

The teleconference was temporarily suspended because the space center had questioned Morton Thiokol’s no-launch recommendation and the management of Morton Thiokol had requested the suspension to allow their engineers and management time to asses their recommendation. The Space Center would not launch without the approval from Morton Thiokol’s management.

During the conference Jerald Mason, senior vice president at Morton Thiokol, knew that NASA badly needed a successful flight and that Morton Thiokol was relying on a new contract with NASA and that a recommendation of a no-launch would not enhance the prospects of obtaining the continuing contract with NASA. The engineers could not produce any objective data as to the precise temperature at which it would be unsafe to launch. The engineers were relying on an apparent correlation between temperature and resiliency and their tendency to be conservative and to err on the side of caution on a serious safety O-ring issue.

Jerald Mason, turned to Robert Lund, the supervising engineer, and directed him to “take off your engineering hat and put on your management hat”, essentially telling him forget about your ethical engineering codes to uphold the safety and well-being of the general public and to consider the political and economic repercussions of a no launch decision. When the conference was resumed, a unanimous decision was made by Morton Thiokol to go ahead with the launch.

Both NASA’s and Morton Thiokol’s management had gotten themselves into the ethical trap of using nihilism as the basis of their ok to launch decision. They had succumbed to the doctrine that all value judgments including moral judgments had lost their meaning and only the political and economical implications of a no-launch were more important than a decision not to launch that particular day.

They had also fallen into the trap of Moral Objectivism, the view that moral principles no longer had objective validity, because they could not objectively prove that the rubber O-rings would fail at lower temperatures.

Egoism also came into play on NASA’s and Thiokol’s decision to go ahead with the launch as both companies viewed their actions as being right in protecting their own self interests each succumbing to their own economic interests to continue receiving continued funding from the Federal Government. They had also succumbed to the trap of Altruism where their own self-interests overrode the safety and welfare of the astronauts. NASA did explain to the astronaut’s part of the problem, but only part of the problem, thereby the astronauts were only armed with partial data for their decision to go ahead with the launch. NASA had fallen into the trap of Ethical relativism by continually lowering its safety standards in continually accepting more and more risk to continue with the space launches. At Morton Thiokol, Roger Boisjoly was subjected to emotivism by his managers in order to continue receiving contract funding from NASA to continue manufacturing the solid fuel booster rockets that the company depended on.

In a remote way, everyone involved in the decision to launch could be cited as being involved in hedonism and that the best life is a life that is devoid of pain. Everyone down the line would feel pain if NASA was to loose government funding of the space shuttle program, thereby all involved would find a reduction of their economic lifestyles which would result in a decrease of their own pleasure in life.

Recommendations:

Recommendations in this case are extremely difficult because all the people involved in this case all along the way reduced themselves to a group think mentality and continued to go along with status quo within the chain of command and the decision making process. NASA should have held steadfast to their rule of a no-launch decision based on the advice of even just one engineer’s belief, such as Rodger Boisjoly’s belief to a no-launch, even though Roger’s opinion was just that, an opinion and was subjective, to have not launched. In a way he could have even just called it an educated guess that it was unsafe to launch based on the fact that rubber tends to loose its resiliency at lower temperatures. An automobile mechanic and even an auto parts counterman with a considerably lower education than these people is fully aware of this problem. Most will recommend to you to avoid sudden stops in severely colder temperatures because the pressure at lower temperatures will cause the primary rubber cup seal of a brake master cylinder will cause it to fail resulting in subsequent brake failure do to reduced resiliency of the rubber at lower temperatures. Either of these people would describe the problem so eloquently, but are fully aware of the problem due to the amount of master cylinder repairs done on such cold days. Any auto mechanic or counterman would tell you it is the second most often job done on the coldest day of the year next to battery replacement and starter replacement.

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