Lockheed rapped for skipping Genesis test

By Jim Erickson, Rocky Mountain News

January 6, 2006

Lockheed Martin failed to do a critical prelaunch test that would have uncovered the flaw that doomed NASA's $264 million Genesis capsule, investigators have concluded.

The test would have revealed that four tiny switches designed to trigger the release of the Denver-built capsule's parachutes were installed backward.

The installation error, combined with the omitted test, sealed the fate of the blunt-nosed capsule, said Michael Ryschkewitsch, chairman of the Genesis Mishap Investigation Board.

Because its parachutes failed to deploy, the Genesis capsule slammed into the Utah salt flats at 193 mph on Sept. 8, 2004.

Its scientific cargo - silicon wafers etched with billions of microscopic pieces of the sun's atmosphere - shattered.

"Clearly there was an error made, and there were some shortfalls in processes that you would hope would catch it," Ryschkewitsch said in an interview Thursday. "The safety nets were not there."

The board's 150-page final report is expected to be released this month, said Ryschkewitsch, deputy director of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland.

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