Description of Driving Event:
Lack of Schedule Slack in ISS Program Causing Potential Decrease in Prelaunch Ground Testing
Lesson(s) Learned:
The schedules for ISS buildup are tight, and there is little, if any, schedule slack to accommodate late or unavailable hardware. Schedule and/or budget pressures could lead to deferring work to orbit or curtailing prelaunch testing.
Recommendation(s):
ISS program plans for finishing and testing hardware before launch should not be compromised to meet either launch schedules or budgets.
Evidence of Recurrence Control Effectiveness:
NASA concurs. Integration testing is in the approved program's current baseline. Prelaunch integrated testing at KSC is based on the degree to which this testing abates program risk, weighed against the hardware damage risk and the cost and schedule impacts. The content for component, subassembly, and element-level testing is the minimum requirement for specification compliance verification. A program-approved change would be required to eliminate this work. In fact, integration and testing are being strengthened as opportunities develop. A proposal to conduct multi-element integration testing is being planned, which would exploit the unique KSC ground processing expertise. This would involve actual flight hardware to conduct end-to-end testing for assembly elements 3A, 4A, 5A, and 6A in the manner that these elements would be assembled on-orbit. ISS program requirements for on-orbit stage and assembly-complete capability reflect a thoroughly reviewed baseline. This baseline generally reflects a minimum required capability, which has incorporated improvements to satisfy an achievable crew workload. There is strong inherent resistance in the program, therefore, to bringing incomplete hardware to be processed at KSC, much less than to orbit, because of the minimum capability constraints and crew workload impacts.
Documents Related to Lesson:
N/A
Mission Directorate(s):
- Space Operations
- Exploration Systems
Additional Key Phrase(s):
- Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel
- Ground Operations
- Policy & Planning
- Risk Management/Assessment
- Test & Verification
Additional Info:
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