President of The Aerospace
Corporation Testifies on
Launch Failures; Affirms Value of Company's
Role in Verification Process
(E. C. "Pete" Aldridge, Jr., president of The Aerospace Corporation, was among the space officials called to testify June 15 in Washington, D.C., at a public hearing before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on the recent series of U.S. launch failures. His prepared testimony follows.)
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. (6/28/99) -- Mr. Chairman, I will address one of the many issues raised by the committee--specifically, "the adequacy and appropriateness of government/FFRDC oversight" for the space launch program.
I am president and CEO of The Aerospace Corporation, a nonprofit corporation that operates a federally funded research and development center (an FFRDC) for the Department of Defense under the sponsorship of the Air Force.
The Aerospace Corporation was established in 1960 by congressional direction to provide engineering services to the Air Force for the development, launch and operation of national security space programs.
As an alternative to establishing an internal, organic engineering workforce of military and civilians for this purpose, the government decided to essentially "outsource" the engineering functions to a private organization, which became The Aerospace Corporation.
The Air Force contracts with The Aerospace Corporation to "operate" an FFRDC and imposes certain restrictions on its operation. The FFRDC is prohibited from manufacturing products and competing with industry, and must strictly avoid conflicts of interest.
The tasks assigned to an FFRDC are reviewed to ensure that they are in strict accordance with established criteria and not in competition with industrial capabilities.
Objective Arm of Government
In this regard, we are an objective and independent arm of the government for advising the government on how to obtain the very best space products from industry and ensuring the taxpayer is getting the highest quality product to support our national security space needs.
We serve as the "continuity" of experience in the military space program and provide the breadth of knowledge across all national security space programs--military and NRO [National Reconnaissance Office]. We support not only launch vehicles, but also satellites, ground stations, support facilities, and the technology base.
The relationship between the FFRDC and government has been a long-term commitment that was meant to inspire the same mission success motivations that government employees have while also addressing the need for a stable, technically sophisticated workforce to deal with the special problems posed by space systems.
Space Systems Unique Challenge
Mission success for space systems is a unique challenge, because in almost any other system it is possible to recover from failures without losing the entire investment--but not for space systems.
As we have seen, it's possible to lose billions of dollars in a matter of seconds with no ability to recover. The government has always recognized its unique responsibility in this area and has used the Aerospace FFRDC to help meet these responsibilities.
The corporation employs 3,000 people, of which some 2,000 are highly skilled and experienced engineers and scientists. About 70 percent of the technical population have advanced degrees (M.S. and Ph.D.). Their average experience in the space industry is about 22 years. A majority of our engineering workforce was previously employed in the aerospace industry.
Savings to Government $1-2 Billion Per Year
We estimate, and in many cases we believe there is clear evidence, that we save the government approximately $1-2 billion per year in cost avoidance from errors and failures. The DOD funding for Aerospace this year is $365 million. We believe history has shown that the space program benefits from this investment, which provides close verification by independent teams for spacecraft, launch vehicles and ground systems.
One of the primary functions of the FFRDC is to perform launch verification and readiness assessments for the Air Force and NRO. The process of determining whether a vehicle is ready to launch depends on many human judgments, expert opinions and technical analyses.
Challenger Lesson
As we learned from the Challenger accident, it's possible to convince ourselves that it is safe to launch when it is not. When so much is at stake, there must be a verification process that creates the tension we need to challenge our own assumptions and bring to bear as many expert opinions as possible. This has to be done throughout the lifecycle of the program without unduly raising costs.
To the extent that we can, we perform the following assessments:
- audit of requirements, designs and interfaces
- manufacturing process monitoring, hardware reviews and acceptance
- verification of mission planning
- review of vehicle buildup, test, and launch-site activities
- support to range and safety organizations
- participation in countdown and launch
- evaluation of postflight data
This process not only involves the launch vehicle, but also the readiness of the satellite to perform its mission on orbit and the ability of the ground facilities to support on-orbit operations.
The Aerospace FFRDC receives its funds to support these activities through a single contract with the Air Force. However, there is no "line item" in the DOD budget for this.
Each program office pays for our services with funds authorized and appropriated by the Congress for that program. The level of our activity is directly and fundamentally tied to the size and level of activity of the national security space program approved by Congress.
But funding is not the only issue. Over the last several years, the depth to which we perform verification activities has decreased due to direction by program management, Air Force leadership, and Congress.
Decline in Funding, Staff Size
The changing nature of government acquisition practice and the natural "maturing" of space launch programs have resulted in a decline in FFRDC funding and staff size over several years.
Since 1993 our total staff size has decreased about 30 percent, with a 24 percent reduction in our technical staff. There has been a 35 percent reduction in the technical staff directly associated with launch vehicle assessments.
The plan is for this reduction to continue as the Delta, Atlas and Titan fly-out their remaining vehicles over the next few years, and we take a different approach to government and FFRDC oversight for the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV). From over 500 launch vehicle experts available in 1993, the plan is to reduce our launch vehicle support to somewhere between 50 and 150 technical personnel within the next 4-5 years.
While our independent launch assurance function will continue until these more significant staff reductions are implemented, the depth and independence of our activities have already been reduced.
Expertise Spread Thinner
We have less direct participation and concurrent evaluation during the spacecraft and space launch vehicle manufacturing process. We place more reliance on plans, reports and after-the-fact evaluations.
We have changed from a "prove acceptable to fly" to "prove not acceptable to fly." We are more dependent on contractor analysis than on our own independent analysis. And finally, our expertise is simply spread much thinner than in the past.
Since launch verification and readiness is one of the major functions of the corporation, you might ask the question: "Where was Aerospace in preventing these six failures?"
First, three of the failures were commercial launches for which Aerospace had no responsibility. And, I should add that two of those failures (Delta III and the Delta III upper stage) were associated with new launch vehicles, which traditionally have much higher failure rates than mature programs. The other three failures were associated with equipment for which Aerospace had and continues to have insight and expertise (Titan IV, Inertial Upper Stage, and Centaur).
Complex Systems
The complexity of space systems is such that no one can independently certify--that is, detect and correct every error--for every aspect of every system in a cost-effective manner.
The failure of the Titan IV booster last fall involved a faulty wire harness, which produced a latent failure condition that is very hard to detect in advance. In the other two failures, the Titan IV booster worked perfectly, but the upper stages, Centaur and IUS, failed. The final failure reports have not been completed, so it is not clear whether Aerospace should or could have detected the errors prior to launch.
In the case of the Centaur upper stage, where the guidance system failed, perhaps we could have caught the mistake if we had assigned many more people to this effort. But what is very clear, from my perspective, is that in both events the contractor's processes should have caught the mistakes.
It is apparent from these cases that no matter how "mature" a system becomes, it is still subject to manufacturing defects or process errors that can ultimately cause the loss of the mission.
Close Verification Pays Off
The launch systems we're using have always benefited from a close verification by an independent team. The mission success statistics for the last 30 years show that space launch reliability goes up as the government increases verification activities, and reliability goes down as those functions are reduced.
The conclusion to be drawn from this is that a comprehensive and independent launch verification process directly contributes to overall mission success. Launch verification must be done either by the government/FFRDC team, the contractor, or a combination of both to protect our investments and our access to space.
