Essay, Research Paper: The Challenger Accident

The Challenger disaster was not only a disaster in terms of the
destruction of the spacecraft and the death of its crew but also in
terms of the decision-making process that led to the launch and in
terms of the subsequent investigation into the "causes" of the
disaster.

The decision to recommend for launch was made by lower-level
management officials over the objections of technical experts who
opposed the launch under the environmental conditions that existed
on the launch pad at the time. Furthermore, the lower-level
managers who made this decision--both NASA and contractor
personnel--chose not to report the objections of the technical experts
in their recommendations to higher levels in the management chain-
of-command to proceed with the launch. Finally, it seems that the
lower-level managers had also received out-of-the-ordinary
pressure from higher levels of management (some allusions
suggested this pressure may have come all the way from the White
House) to proceed with the launch on time.

The subsequent investigation began with efforts to determine the
technical causes of the explosion of the Challenger. Initially, the
decision-making process leading to the launch was not considered by
investigators. This suggests that the initial purpose of the
investigation was not concerned with ethical issues or issues of
responsibility. As the investigation proceeded, information emerged-
-through leaks to the press--that suggested that NASA had been
aware of the risk of explosion under the environmental conditions
that existed for the Challenger launch for several months prior to the
launch. Also, the opposition of the technical experts to the launch
just prior to the decision to launch became known to the
investigators as well. These two pieces of information changed the
nature of the investigation mid-stream from an effort to determine
the technical cause of the explosion of the spacecraft to an
investigation of the decision-making process leading to the launch.

Viewing the Challenger disaster as an ethical problem would lead to
an effort to determine whether the decision to launch was "right" or
"wrong." Clearly, the explosion was an accident. It may have been
an accident that might have been prevented or anticipated but the
decision to launch was clearly a matter of judgement--albeit of
apparently poor judgement in retrospect--rather than a matter of
"rightness" or "wrongness." As such, an examination of the
Challenger disaster as an ethical problem does little to illuminate the
issue. A more appropriate ethical analysis would seek to understand
the ways in which the decision-making process itself fostered or
hindered responsibility among individuals within the organization
and of the organization itself.

In this respect, when viewed as a problem of responsibility, the
Challenger disaster presents a much more insightful lesson on the
nature of decision-making in a large organization such as NASA.
While it seems clear that the decision that led to the explosion of the
Challenger was made by those lower-level managers who chose to
ignore the objections of technical experts who opposed the launch,
the subsequent investigation revealed how the decision-making
processes within NASA (and it contractors) worked to limit the
agency of decision-makers and to obscure accountability for their
decision-making.

The problem of responsibility in the decision-making process focuses
upon three issues: the availability of information, the role of
technical specifications and formal regulations, and the management
chain-of-command. Each of these factors contributed to the exercise
of poor judgement and to the obscuring of accountability in the
decision-making process.

The availability of information--more precisely the lack of
information--had an impact upon the decision-making process in
three different ways. The technical experts who recommended
against launching were not aware of the nature of the out-of-the-
ordinary pressure upon their managers from higher levels of
management to launch on time. Similarly, the higher-level managers
were not aware of the objections of the technical experts when they
received the recommendation to launch from lower-level managers.
Finally, the lower-level managers, who choose both to ignore the
advice of the technical experts and not to pass those objections along
to their superiors, lacked both an appreciation of the details of the
technical objections to the launch as well as an appreciation of the
nature of the pressure to launch on time. To the extent that each
group lacked complete information, their ability to make decisions
was hampered and their motivation to resort to technical
specifications and formal regulations to resolve issues increased.

The role of technical specifications and formal regulations was
central to the decision-making process. As technical experts and
lower-level managers sought to make decisions with incomplete
information, they turned to technical specifications and formal
regulations to resolve issues. The technical experts were unable to
prove that the Challenger would explode under the environmental
conditions anticipated for launch and thus were repeatedly pressed
by the lower-level managers to provide evidence of the risk from
technical specifications or reason to postpone the launch in formal
procedures. No such specifications or procedures were available.
Similarly, the technical experts, acting with a lack of understanding
about the nature of the pressure upon their superiors to launch on
time, relied upon the formal decision-making procedures when their
objections were overruled and did not report their objections to
higher levels in the management chain-of-command. Thus, the
ability of both groups to act was hampered to the extent they relied
upon technical specification and formal procedures such as the chain-
of-command. Similarly, resorting to specifications and regulations
provided both groups a means to avoid accountability for decisions
that were made on the basis of those specifications and regulations.

The management chain-of-command was the most important aspect
of the decision-making process. No group--technical experts, lower-
level managers, or higher-level managers--ever questioned the
chain-of-command. The technical experts did not choose to express
their objections to the launch outside of the normal channels of the
chain-of-command. Nor did the higher-level managers seek advice
outside the chain-of-command despite the apparent existence of out-
of-the-ordinary pressure to launch on time. Similarly, in their
decision to ignore the objections of the technical experts and to fail to
explain to the technical experts the nature of the out-of-the-ordinary
pressure to launch on time, the lower-level experts assumed the
chain-of-command would not be circumvented. The role of this
emphasis upon the chain-of-command in obscuring accountability
emerged during the investigation. Technical experts at the bottom of
the chain-of-command were not accountable for the the decision to
launch while higher-level managers at the top of the chain-of-
command were not accountable for recognition of the technical risks
associated with launching in the environmental conditions at the
time. Lower-level managers were able to avoid accountability for
both the final decision to launch (made by higher levels of
management) and for recognition of the technical risks associated
with launching (resting in the failure of technical experts to provide
justification against launching in technical specifications or formal
regulations).

Each of these factors--the management chain-of-command, the role
of technical specifications and formal regulations, and the availability
of information--served to both hinder the ability of decision-makers
to act and to obscure accountability for their decision-making. As
such, they served to limit the responsibility of individuals within the
decision-making process and to render that process itself
irresponsible. These obstacles to responsibility within NASA point to
the more important ethical problem that existed beyond the scope of
the specific instance of the Challenger disaster. Namely, the poor
nature of the decision-making process within NASA and its negative
role in fostering responsibility, both on the part of individuals and on
the part of the organization as a whole.