Karl Salting

EGR 402
October 15, 2006

Paper #2

I would portray informed consent as a very important aspect regarding a person’s

rights and personal safety upon action performed under higher authority. Anyone who

puts their own life at risk not only for the benefit of human advancement but for any

other purpose has every liberty to be aware of what they are putting themselves into. In

the case of the Challenger disaster, the video portrayed that these rights were taken away

from the seven brave individuals that took flight in the space shuttle that unfortunate day.

As stated in the textbook, safety measures regarding fixing a field-joint leak was

rejected because of an accompanying reduction in payload. Also, the crew did not have

an escape mechanism. The McDonnell Douglas Company designed an abort module with

its own thruster but the shuttle proposal was not approved. These problems were claimed

by engineers to be dangerous but these pleas were ignored by the business aspect of the

operation.

I believe that the lives of these seven people would have been spared if greed did

not play such a big part in the overall launch program. If informed about the serious

measures regarding their safety, no doubt in my mind that each and every one of the

individuals would have had second thoughts about launching that day. Many aspects

come into play when I say that greed played such a big part that day. People were not

thinking about the safety of the passengers but only about their personal gain. Pressure

from the public and from within NASA and its self image of success also played a big

role in why they launched that day.

 I truly admire Roger Boisjoly’s act of courage. Not many people these days have

the audacity to step up and go against what the majority regards as the standard of how to

act. He said in the video that the reason why he brought it up to higher authorities was

because of the way he was raised. He stated that he was raised in a good family where he

was taught by his mother to have good morals. These good morals were obviously what

he lived by and what he carried over as he grew older and became a professional

engineer. He applied these good ethics into his profession.

The first most important thing I learned from the Challenger disaster case was a

good idea of how to react if you think something is not right in my work environment. I

know now not to be as hesitant as I was before because it would not only affect my work

experience but more importantly the safety of people who do not have any control over

the situation. My father has always told me that a doctor has responsibility of one life

during an operation in the emergency room, but as engineers we have the responsibility

of many lives that are at stake with one project.

The second most important thing I learned from the Challenger disaster case is

how the concept of trust should not be taken lightly in these types of events. People did

not trust the way that engineers said that it would not be safe. The business minded

people took the lives of the passengers into their own hands without knowing anything

about the safety measures that had to be taken. The engineers were the most technically

minded people who knew what was wrong and the decision to launch should have been

under the grounds of their authority. Even though the passengers knew that they were

putting their lives into immediate danger just by agreeing to launch into space, they

should have been given the benefit of the doubt by informed consent.