From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Jim Choate To: <9fans@cse.psu.edu> In-Reply-To: <002901c31ad7$02501780$e3944251@insultant.net> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Subject: [9fans] Re: exception handling caused the Ariane 5 rocket accident Date: Thu, 15 May 2003 06:50:02 -0500 Topicbox-Message-UUID: ac5e2a56-eacb-11e9-9e20-41e7f4b1d025 On Thu, 15 May 2003, boyd, rounin wrote: > From: "Jim Choate" > > It wasn't Feynman's investigation, he was on the review board. I assume > > you're talking about his great(!) quote about technology and fooling > > Nature, that was not a popular sentiment of the board. The only reason it was > > included was his fame. > > i know i shouldn't even attempt to enter into this, but ... > > he talked to the engineers. they said the probability of a loss of > vehicle was between 1 in 100-300 flights. upper level management > had been quoting 1 in a million [maybe they were guns 'n roses fans?]. > > there have been, say, 150 flights and 2 'loss of vehicle' incidents. > > have i been too cryptic? Irrelevant strawman. It wasn't 'Feynman's' investigation; that assertion is a misrepresentation in the spirit of Feynmans quote in fact. He was a member of a board. The investigation was run by NASA. As to the odds of failure, there was much more involved in the investigation than this simple spindocotorism. There was a travesty of errors commited because underlings wanted to tell their bosses what they wanted to hear. You might try reading the report, I can loan you my copy. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage@ssz.com jchoate@open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org --------------------------------------------------------------------