🚀 go-pugleaf

rk wrote:

> edwright@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> > This is illogical. If I ship a package with Federal Express and they
> > have a maintenance problem with the plane, I don't blamed for it. I can
> > only be blamed for something that was under my control -- like if I
> > shipped hazardous material. By micromanaging everything, NASA
> > *increases* the number of things it can be blamed for.
>
> Arguing by analogy is always a dangerous thing.
>
> If I ship a proposal in via Fed Ex and it doesn't make it to the
> receiving place by the deadline, I believe Fed Ex will only give you
> your $15 back.  You very well be held responsible for that - perhaps
> losing millions in potential revenue for your company - and then fired.
> FedEx will most likely not hire you.  If you do, however, just drive the
> proposal down to where it needs to be, hand it to the person that is
> supposed to receive it, and get a time stamped receipt identifying your
> proposal, then all is well and one doesn't have to rely on any else.

and if you have a break down in your car, or end up stuck in traffic on
the washington beltway, and miss your deadline, then what?

If the package is due locally, and the deadline is short, it seems silly to
send
anything via fedex, when one can instead hire a local courier service and
have a maddened bicycle courier get your package anywhere in 1 hour.

any transit method has fault paths, the competent professional leaves
enough room to succeed inspite of a failure.

leaving millions of dollars in revenue up to the vagaries of a car battery
or traffic congestion, seems much more irresponsible then hiring professional

couriers.


>
> Getting things time stamped and having numbered receipts is done all the
> time.  Not everything has to be done that way nor am I recommended it
> [and thereby cutting off a tangent argument] but some things are done
> that way.
>

um, whatever....


>
>
> > There is little evidence that government micromanagement decreases the
> > chance of failure.
>
> Actually I have seen the numbers [don't know where] that government
> management of launch vehicles results in a higher success rate than the
> same launch vehicles used commercially.  If this is incorrect, then
> please delete this.
>

you are incorrect.

NASA claims a higher success rate then commercial deltas, the USAF clearly
has a lower success rate with the T4 then Industry has with it's suite of
Atlas,delta,ariane.

However, none of these claims are very meaningful due to the very small
numbers involved.
none of these numbers exist to a confidence value of much more then 50%.


>
> Some communications organizations go through their contractors with a
> fine-tooth comb and wield large, powerful axes to those that don't
> follow the rules [former client of mine, great job].  The result is an
> *extremely* high success rate on orbit.  On the other hand, improperly
> done, intrusive monitoring/verification can easily result in more BS
> [budget and schedule] and lower reliability rates.  One can not
> generalize on this, and I make no attempt to do so, but how something is
> done is perhaps more important than what is done.

yes.

>
>
> > NASA blamed the Mars failures on cost-cutting and
> > reduced management, but NASA had considerable control over those
> > missions. The more costly, old-style Battlestar Galatica planetary
> > missions had similar failures, however.
>
> Mars Exploder I comes to mind; any others?  Here I am talking not about
> any failure [and I believe all spacecraft have them] but about failures
> that are mission catastrophic.  Galileo did have some failures that
> reduced mission performance; many of the science goals were met - I
> believe that not all of them were.  Nevertheless, most people regard
> Galileo as a successful mission and there has been excellent science
> returns.

galileo was years behind schedule.

>
>
> Other "Battlestar Galactica" missions that come to mind:
>
>      1. Hubble

years behind schedule

>
>      2. EOS-AM [Terra]

ditto

>
>      3. AXAF

ditto.

>
>      4. Pioneer Venus

was not a Battlestar mission.

>
>      5. Magellan

was not really a battlestar mission.

>
>      6. Voyager I, II

ancient history

>
>      7. Viking I, II and their landers

ditto

>
>      8. Can't remember the name of the other observatory

CGRO?  years behind schedule.

>
>
> SIRTF, EOS-PM (Aqua?) are not launched yet.

and years behind schedule

>
>
> > By contrast, Lunar Prospector
> > and Clementine were successful with much smaller budgets and far less
> > management overhead than the "better, faster, cheaper" Mars missions.
>
> To be complete, we should perhaps add some of the following:
>
>      1. HETE (HETE-II recently launched, launch vehicle failure
>         for the first one.
>      2. Small Explorer/WIRE
>      3. Terriersat
>      4. SAC-? (Argentinian FBC mission)
>
> and I guess there are some others.

one could include all the STEP and MIGHTSAT missions, etc...

> > NASA's own track record hardly puts it in a position to lecture other
> > people on reliability. "My God, Thiokol, when do you want me to
> > launch?" Before you tell me things have changed, riddle me this: Why is
> > NASA spending a billion dollars to develop an escape system for ISS,
> > while making no effort to provide an escape system for the Shuttle,
> > although launch vehicles are demonstrably more dangerous than space
> > stations?
>
> This paragraph assumes that NASA is monolithic and time-invariant.
> False assumptions.
>

however, your list above is also time invariant. mixing missions from the
70's to the 90's