Safety panel says NASA should have taken Starliner incident more seriously

"Invoking the designation also ensures an independent investigation detached from the teams involved in the incident itself, according to retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Susan Helms, chair of the safety panel. "We just, I think, are advocates of safety investigation best practices, and that clearly is one of the top best practices," Helms said. Another member of the safety panel, Mark Sirangelo, said NASA should formally declare mishaps and close calls as soon as possible."

"A few weeks into the Starliner test flight last year, the manager of NASA's Commercial Crew Program, Steve Stich, told reporters the agency's plan was "to continue to return [the astronauts] on Starliner and return them home at the right time." Mark Nappi, then Boeing's Starliner program manager, regularly appeared to downplay the seriousness of the thruster issues during press conferences throughout Starliner's nearly three-month mission."

""Specifically, there's a significant difference, philosophically, between we will work toward proving the Starliner is safe for crew return, versus a philosophy of Starliner is no-go for return, and the primary path is on an alternate vehicle, such as Dragon or Soyuz, unless and until we learn how to ensure the on-orbit failures won't recur on entry with the Starliner," Precourt said."

Formal designation of mishaps or close calls triggers independent investigations detached from teams involved, identified as a top safety-investigation best practice by safety-panel leadership. Early formal declaration accelerates formation of the investigative team, improving effectiveness and delivering quicker results. NASA's decision not to declare a mishap during last year’s Starliner test flight created internal confusion as managers publicly pursued returning astronauts on Starliner despite persistent thruster anomalies. Some officials argued the appropriate posture would have been no-go for return and primary reliance on alternate vehicles such as Dragon or Soyuz until on-orbit failures were understood. Ambiguity persisted while engineers pursued multiple test protocols over the summer.

Read at Ars Technica