NASA: Fewer and Better

NASA may be on the verge of chucking its longtime “faster-better-cheaper” mantra in favor of a more sensible philosophy best summarized as “success first.” That should mean fewer but better-organized missions.

Last week, NASA Associate Administrator Ed Weiler said that to rein in soaring costs in the aftermath of back-to-back Mars mission failures last year, his agency will build a Mars lander at its Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, rather than work in partnership with the contractor that built the two failed Mars probes--Colorado-based Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co.

The decision should help NASA tighten quality control, which it had recklessly loosened when it began extensive outsourcing in the mid-1980s. The lander will also employ tried-and-true technologies rather than experiment with new ones; it’s basically a larger and longer-range version of the successful Sojourner rover that wowed Mars enthusiasts three years ago.

The agency’s shift is encouraging because several extensive audits have blamed the faster-better-cheaper approach for a recent slew of mission failures. One particularly caustic but credible report, signed by 11 top NASA managers, concluded that the approach “shortchanged” critically needed testing and scrapped old, proven management techniques in favor of new, unproven ones.

NASA also needs to sharpen oversight and control space mission costs, which have risen as much as 40% above projections. It should begin by scrapping ridiculously unworkable plans like sending astronauts to Mars, which could cost up to $30 billion. And it should cancel, or at least provide better justification for, missions whose scientific payoff is unclear. This includes the Pluto-Kuiper Express, a probe to a planet of relatively low interest to astronomers and geologists.

Daniel Cotton, the director of a third and less well known NASA mission that failed last year, an atmospheric research satellite called TERRIERS, recently underscored a lesson at the heart of all the recent NASA audits. “There are a million details in one of these projects,” he said, “and you must pay attention to every single one. It takes time, it takes effort, and, at the bottom line, it takes money.” All are good reasons for choosing missions more stringently.