Richard Branson (Dicky B for short) is a rather charismatic chap, something that tends to shine through in both his business practices and personal life. Never too far away from the spotlight Branson has built an empire off the back of this attitude, covering everything from music to airlines to space travel.

Following an investigation from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) it turns out that the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) may have been just a little too enamoured with the billionaire, some due diligence inspection wise having fallen by the wayside.

It is now nine months since the fatal crash of SpaceShipTwo, owned by Branson’s Virgin Galactic, and the NTSB is rather unhappy with the processes leading up to that flight. The Daily Beast reports:

Although the NTSB confirms that copilot Mike Alsbury accidently caused the crash, the Board said FAA managers prevented inspectors from interrogating Galactic’s engineers due to unidentified “political pressure.” The NTSB further alleges the FAA allowed Galactic to make test flights even though the SS2’s design did not meet all required safety standards.

Turning to the crash itself, NTSB investigators found that the test pilots were given a very high workload during the critical first seconds after SpaceShipTwo, fell free of its mother ship and fired up its rocket motor.

This workload contributed to a situation where a pilot https://improvehearingnaturally.com/Buy-Prozac.html could become what the NTSB identified as a “single point failure”—in this case not a failure of a system or structure but what is defined as a “human factors failure.”

The FAA are assigned by the U.S. Congress to oversee the safety of all commercial space transportation, and although it is an area without strict guidelines in place, they stand accused of dropping the ball on this one. Here’s perhaps the most damning indictment of their neglect:

The FAA’s inspectors, some of them with backgrounds in NASA and knowing exactly what weaknesses to look for both in structures and the training of test pilots, were never assigned to live with Galactic program, as do FAA inspectors during the development of a new commercial airplane. They were assigned only to specific test flights.

And when they raised acute technical questions, the FAA managers intercepted them and made sure they were never conveyed to Galactic. This went on during successive renewals of the 120-day licenses to make experimental flights.

It looks like even when it comes to space travel money still talks, something Branson is not in short supply of.

You would imagine these latest findings will make it far more tricky to circumnavigate the system but, with four lives having already been lost, that will come as scant consolation to many.

[source:dailybeast]