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    Unavailable
    The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA, Enlarged Edition
    Unavailable
    The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA, Enlarged Edition
    Unavailable
    The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA, Enlarged Edition
    Ebook947 pages14 hours

    The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA, Enlarged Edition

    By Diane Vaughan

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    When the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded on January 28, 1986, millions of Americans became bound together in a single, historic moment. Many still vividly remember exactly where they were and what they were doing when they heard about the tragedy. Diane Vaughan recreates the steps leading up to that fateful decision, contradicting conventional interpretations to prove that what occurred at NASA was not skullduggery or misconduct but a disastrous mistake.
    Why did NASA managers, who not only had all the information prior to the launch but also were warned against it, decide to proceed? In retelling how the decision unfolded through the eyes of the managers and the engineers, Vaughan uncovers an incremental descent into poor judgment, supported by a culture of high-risk technology. She reveals how and why NASA insiders, when repeatedly faced with evidence that something was wrong, normalized the deviance so that it became acceptable to them. In a new preface, Vaughan reveals the ramifications for this book and for her when a similar decision-making process brought down NASA's Space Shuttle Columbia in 2003.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press
    Release dateJan 4, 2016
    ISBN9780226346960
    Unavailable
    The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA, Enlarged Edition

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    Reviews for The Challenger Launch Decision

    3.5/5

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    • 5/5
      Institutions Create and Condone RiskThe Space Shuttle Challenger exploded on January 28, 1986. To millions of viewers, it is a moment they will never forget. Official inquiries into the accident placed the blame with a “frozen, brittle O ring.” In this book, Diane Vaughan, a Boston College Professor of Sociology, does not stop there. In what I think is a brilliant piece of research, she traces the threads of the disaster's roots to fabric of NASA’s institutional life and culture.NASA saw itself competing for scarce resources. This fostered a culture that accepted risk-taking and corner-cutting as norms that shaped decision-making. Small, seemingly harmless modifications to technical and procedural standards propelled the space agency toward the disaster. No specific rules were broken, yet well-intentioned people produced great harm.Vaughan often resorts to an academic writing style, yet there is no confusion about its conclusion. “The explanation of the Challenger launch is a story of how people who worked together developed patterns that blinded them to the consequences of their actions,” wrote Dr. Vaughan.“It is not only about the development of norms but about the incremental expansion of normative boundaries: how small changes--new behaviors that were slight deviations from the normal course of events- gradually became the norm, providing a basis for accepting additional deviance. Nor rules were violated; there was no intent to do harm. Yet harm was done. Astronauts died.”For project and risk managers, this book offers a rare warning of the hazards of working in structured and institutionalized environments.
    • 5/5
      This is the definitive book about the Challenger disaster. It's long and involved, but it will change your mind about what caused the disaster.