Shuttle panel divided over NASA compliance

HOUSTON, April 6 - After a week of private and often heated internal debate, the independent panel appointed to oversee NASA's relaunch of the space shuttle appears unable to complete its final report on whether the agency has complied with safety recommendations.

The Return to Flight Task Group, better known as the "Stafford-Covey committee" after its leading members, does not have the authority to stop NASA's launch schedule, or even recommend that it be delayed — at least, not officially. But if the panel does not sign off on the safety report, NASA officials will be put in an awkward position right before the first scheduled space shuttle launch in more than two years.

Seven months after the space shuttle Columbia and its crew were lost on Feb. 1, 2003, the Columbia Accident Investigation Board published an in-depth analysis of both the technical and underlying cultural flaws that led to the disaster and issued specific prescriptions for hardware, operational, and cultural fixes. The task group was organized by NASA a year ago as a way to independently monitor the agency's progress in meeting those recommendations.

A scheduled public meeting to discuss the remaining issues before the task group was cancelled last week, surprising observers. Rumors began spreading about major disagreements erupting between board members at a private plenary meeting.

Ostensibly, the delay was due to NASA’s tardiness in providing required test data, but the larger question seemed to be whether the task group will have enough time to properly assess the test data, whenever it does show up.

Behind closed space doors
A member of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board said he was told the dispute at the private meeting was more alarming than just a bureaucratic delay.

“I heard things went non-linear on the first day when [task group member] Dan Crippen basically led a revolt," against Tom Stafford and Richard Covey, the two former astronauts  leading the group, the CAIB member told MSNBC.com on condition of anonymity. The revolt's basic premise, this source said, was that NASA was not ready to fly since “none of the hard recommendations have been met and NASA is ‘diddling’ with the numbers to make it appear they are working.”

A short-notice meeting held in Washington on Monday between the Stafford-Covey group leaders and NASA managers lasted well into mid-afternoon. NASA spokesman Allard Beutel characterized the meeting as "a status check, an administrative meeting to find out where they are in getting NASA’s information they need.”

Sources close to the Stafford-Covey group who spoke with MSNBC.com on condition their names not be used said a new plenary meeting had been scheduled for April 22-23. At that time, the group will review NASA safety reports now being completed. Debris damage studies are to be delivered late this week, and on April 14 NASA will conduct a test of Discovery's external fuel tank as the shuttle sits on the launch pad in Florida

By this point, shuttle program veterans have said, thousands of workers will be deeply engaged in the momentum towards the Discovery launch, the window for which opens on May 15. “Launch fever” is not a frame of mind conducive to dispassionate consideration of ambiguous or unsatisfactory situations.

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