Audit Finds Safety Monitoring of Shuttle Contractor Is Flawed

NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston failed to keep adequate watch on safety operations of a major contractor responsible for space shuttle operations, an internal NASA audit says.

The audit, completed in March but not released until Friday, reported problems in the supervision of United Space Alliance’s safety procedures. The space center is responsible for that oversight.

United Space Alliance, a joint venture of Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin Corp., is the prime contractor for the space shuttle program with NASA’s $8.6-billion spaceflight operation contract.

The contractor’s duties include space shuttle modification, testing checkout, and launch and landing activities at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., and flight operations at the Johnson Space Center.

Among problems auditors found:

* The Johnson safety office did not provide staff and other support needed to control adequately $13 million in space shuttle program money or to ensure the safety of United Space Alliance’s work on key components of the space shuttle program.

* United Space Alliance’s reporting of close calls and mishaps needed improvement.

United Space Alliance “is responsible for the day-to-day operation and management of the U.S. space shuttle fleet; thus USA’s work affects the safety of NASA’s astronauts, the space shuttle orbiters and other space hardware, personnel and equipment,” said the report by the NASA inspector general’s office.

The inspector general’s office said Johnson Space Center management did not agree with all the findings but its efforts to fix the problems were responsive.

“It sounds to me Johnson Space Center has taken the report very seriously with some caveats, because safety in the shuttle office--especially since the accident--has been of paramount importance,” said space center spokesman Dan Carpenter, who had not seen the report. The accident he spoke of was the 1986 explosion of the shuttle Challenger, which killed all seven crew members.