Recognize: There was a failure to take safety into serious consideration. Even though there were many doubts and conflict within different departments, no one said anything either out of fear or pressure.
Clarify the Facts: On January 31st of 2003, the American space shuttle holding 7 civilians met disaster when reentering the earth’s atmosphere. There was much speculation before the incident that something had gone wrong on lift off. However because of lack of concrete proof and urgency, the problem was not addressed strongly. This gave the impression that NASA was not very organized and did not work hard for safety.
Create Alternatives:
NASA could have had more investigation done on the incident that caused Columbia’s accident. NASA could have run more tests before launch to ensure the safety of the passengers incase anything went wrong.
The people could have spoke out their doubts and intuitions rather than hide it because they were afraid.
Evaluate Alternatives:
If NASA valued the safety of the passengers and Columbia over the completion of the mission, than the passengers may have been saved. Although more tests and delay of time in space would cost more money, you must weigh life against money and realize that the ethical decision for NASA would have been to value safety before efficiency. One of the workers was afraid to email Ham because he thought his position was too low, so he could have emailed his supervisor or even sent it as an anonymous email.
Decide & Implement Decisions: The most ethical thing to have done was to insure the safety of the passengers on Columbia. It would also have just been, logically speaking, the right thing to do. The preservation of life should take precedence over success or efficiency and money saving. Because NASA had lost sight of the riskiness of space shuttle launches, they underestimated the dangers of little accidents.
Evaluate...