The aerospace community is now suffering from exactly what was predicted by older engineers. The companies are now becoming populated with mediocre calibre engineers who are too young & have zero experience, but huge self belief. The old guys have left & the middle management are just as complacent as the 12 year old engineers they are supposed to supervise.
As a friend said humanity has a 30 collective memory, Apollo 13 was in flight 50 years ago, you do the math.
Space-X crushing their own rocket is beyond belief. Boeing, who after all are well known for their recent programming & risk analysis skills (anyone for a 737max8 ?) being allowed to launch a defective vehicle, just shows how far the rot has set in. When your 12 year old programmer fucks up an app, it’s embarrassing. As Gus Grissom said, when asked how it felt just before launch of his Mercury mission, “How would you feel knowing your sitting on the efforts of a 100 low bidders”. As regards Apollo 13 O2 tank issue showed, assumptions & lack of QA lead to fuck ups.
The Boeing 777, would not fly. The new boys used computers & said all good to go. The old boys who were still around when it first flew insisted on some empirical testing. The engine stalled it’s compressor on first take off due to a bad “computer modelled” inlet lip. Luckily it was attached to the 747 test bed airframe that was able to fly on its other three engines. If the old boys had not prevailed, then the first 777 test flight would have crashed & probably killed the program.
You have been warned, supervise your 12 year olds, QA their work & ensure a robust & comprehensive risk analysis is performed on all designs, whether physical or virtual. Lives may depend on it.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
