Space Mission Mishaps - What Can We Learn?

Joe Nieberding, Co-founder and President of
Aerospace Engineering Associates (AEA)

Astronomy Club of Akron, Inc.

KIWANIS CIVIC CENTER  
725 Portage Lakes Dr
Akron, OH  44319

Friday November 20 2009 at 8:00PM - last meeting in 2009.  Next meeting: January 22, 2010

Anyone!  Absolutely free and open to the public.

Only an interest in astronomy!

What went wrong? How did it happen? Could it happen again? How can we avoid repeating the mistakes of the past? No one knows like the people who were there, and have the scars to prove it. The majority of space mishaps can be traced to human error, not to rocket science. Examining and understanding the root causes of actual space mission failures is critical to helping today’s engineers of any highly complex systems identify lessons learned, and translate these lessons into real strategies for eliminating root causes. Implementing specific strategies and project principles is the best means of prevention. Recognizing why the lessons of the past are not learned is also a critical step in solving the problem. “Space System Mishaps-What Can We Learn?” is a discussion excerpted from a two day NASA class on the same subject, aimed at further strengthening system quality standards by understanding why they broke down in the past and what to do about it.

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Joe Nieberding has more than four decades of management and technical experience leading and participating in NASA independent review teams and evaluating NASA advanced space mission planning. During his 35 years at NASA Lewis Research Center (now NASA Glenn), he directed numerous studies to help select transportation, propulsion, power, and communications systems for advanced NASA mission applications. His Advanced Space Analysis Office led all of Lewis’s exploration advanced concept studies for returning to the moon and travelling to MARS. In addition, he was a launch team member at Kennedy Space Center on more than 65 Atlas/Centaur and Titan/Centaur launches. Joe retired from NASA in 2000, and has continued consulting for them, as well as for other federal agencies. Joe is a recognized expert in launch vehicles and advanced transportation architecture planning for space missions. Joe is co-founder and President of Aerospace Engineering Associates (AEA).