It’s dangerous to ignore obvious warning signs, which is one of the outcomes of a troubled organizational culture. We never have perfect information, but we should not act as if we are indestructible.
The Space Shuttle Challenger disaster occurred on January 28, 1986 at 11:39 A.M.
Some Details
The explosion happened just over a minute after the launch. Record low temperatures the night before caused the chain of events that led to the breakup of the spacecraft.
One of the outcomes of the review that followed was criticism of the troubled organizational culture at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). In short, they ignored the warnings about vulnerability due to low temperatures.
Where I Was On Launch Day
At the time, I worked at Harris Corporation in Melbourne, Florida. Melbourne is approximately 25 miles from Cape Canaveral.
That location was close enough that we could watch earlier launches of the Space Shuttle from our home in Palm Bay, near Melbourne.
We watched a night launch of the Challenger in 1983. I remember thinking that the night launch was like watching the sunrise because it was so bright.
On the morning of the 1986 launch I was on a conference call at Harris Corporation headquarters. We were speaking with someone in our Atlanta office.
During the call we felt the windows shake in the building.
One of us on the Harris side of the call made the comment that we thought the Space Shuttle had just exploded. As expected, people from our office ran outside to see the smoke flume in the sky.
Unsurprisingly, there was non-stop news coverage.
That afternoon, the TV’s in the offices at Harris were all tuned into the reports. On one of the replays I remember someone in the room saying that there was no way there would be survivors.
Where My Wife Was
My wife was at home that morning. She was standing in the front yard to watch the launch. She was holding our youngest at the time, who was almost three years old. Her older brother and sister were at school that day.
A neighbor of ours was on his roof with a camera on a tripod to record the launch. The neighbor on the roof nearly fell off when the explosion happened!
My wife saw the sparks and smoke flume as the accident was occurring. Cyndi ran into the house and phoned me immediately.
Christa McAuliffe
One of the Challenger crew members was Christa McAuliffe. She was a 37-year old high school social studies teacher from New Hampshire.
She was scheduled to be the first participant in NASA’s Teacher in Space project.
Christa trained for a year prior to the launch. In her memory, a number of schools were named after her, including one in Palm Bay where we lived, which is a few miles from Melbourne, Florida.
From Proverbs 14.16 we learn that a wise person recognizes, then avoids, potential problems. However, someone who is foolishly overconfident gets angry at the challenge, perhaps believing he/she can never fail or be held accountable. proverbsforprofessionals.net
Troubled Organizational Culture
One finding from the Rogers Commission Report following the Challenger Disaster was the troubled organizational culture at NASA. That report was release just over four months after the incident.
Although they made changes in safety protocols, there was another Space Shuttle disaster in February 2003. That 2003 accident was caused by a recurring problem noted in prior launches with foam insulation that during the 2003 flight proved to be fatal.
Therefore, the Space Shuttle program had two catastrophic failures in 135 flights.
Part of the problem was a NASA culture that was pressured to show success, thus the push to take risks.
Upper management was making decisions based on what proved to be totally unrealistic estimates for the likely failure of components. Those estimates were not supported by the design engineers who worked in the program.
A second component of the troubled culture was the difficulty in getting contrary information up the chain of command when there were problems.
In this case, there was a telephone conference the night prior to launch. In that call engineers expressed strong concerns about the impact of the cold weather on the booster rockets. Those concerns were challenged, then reversed.
NASA executives made the fatal decision to launch the next morning despite the warnings about the cold weather.
Ignored Warnings
In the Challenger case, the design flaw that caused the accident had been a concern among engineers for nearly ten years prior the incident in 1986. There were some problems, but no catastrophic failures until the January 1986 launch.
Unfortunately, flawed assumptions about risks, and unrealistic expectations about performance levels, led to the disaster. Those types of issues are complicated as an organization gets bigger and tries to balance conflicting political and engineering demands.
Proverbs 22.3 presents a stern warning. It says a critical thinking person will recognize risks and take corrective action. Conversely, a simple-minded or shallow person will ignore the warnings, thus will walk into serious problems. Unfortunately, our flawed decisions can, at times, impact people other than ourselves. proverbsforprofessionals.net
Some Takeaways
On a much smaller scale, we each take risks in life. For example, in choices related to our careers. That said, it’s dangerous to ignore obvious warning signs.
We never have perfect information, but we should not act as if we are indestructible, which is one of the outcomes of a troubled organizational culture.
Foresight is of much greater value than hindsight! Certainly we can learn from both failures and successes, hence the value of hindsight. But, our lives are less prone to disaster if we use foresight to carefully consider likely outcomes, then act accordingly.
Remember, all successes are not because we are absolutely wonderful planners or have such incredible foresight! In Ecclesiastes 9.11 Solomon notes that “time and chance happen” meaning the fastest and strongest don’t always win. And, sometimes I win solely due to a chance occurrence.
Also remember, we get the culture we’re willing to tolerate. So, beware of what you allow to continue – personally or in the organization where you work. Truly, dodging disaster is a dangerous way to live your life!
Granted, there’s no guarantee of never failing. That is, unless we choose to never take risks. A balanced life recognizes the growth that’s possible from risk taking. But, it balances those risks with the careful analysis provided by foresight, tempered by the hindsight of learnings from our prior experiences.