Skip to main content

Challenging the Challenger

Like a lot of people who studied physics I hold Richard Feynman in great regard and put him up with the likes of Newton and Einstein. If you haven't come across Feynman, he was one of the lead theoreticians developing the atomic bomb in the Manhattan Project, went on to get a Nobel Prize for his work on Quantum Electrodynamics - the hugely successful theory of how light and matter interact - developed the approach and diagrams that were crucial to vast swathes of quantum theory and, towards the end of his life, became a bit of a celebrity because of his role in the enquiry into the Challenger shuttle disaster.

This is of interest now because the BBC has recently shown a drama-documentary, Challenger, on Feynman's role in that enquiry. If you hurry (and are UK based) you can still catch it on BBC iPlayer.

Feynman was, effectively, the only truly independent person on the commission, and where the rest seemed largely inclined to try to minimise any negative impact on NASA, Feynman wanted to get to the truth. He hadn't particularly wanted to do this job, seeing it as primarily bureaucratic, but if he was doing it, he would understand the science and technology and get to the truth - which, with some semi-undercover steers from engineers on the project, he did.

Challenger's solid rocket boosters failed because it was very cold on the launch day, and the rubber O-ring seals failed to flex into place. Feynman's gift for theatre (and he was a superb lecturer) was responsible for breaking the wall of silence. It was claimed at a televised commission hearing that the O-rings would not lose their flexibility down to -40*. Feynman put a clamped O-ring into a glass of iced water and on camera released the clamps to show that it did in fact lose flexibility at freezing point - and it was a good few degrees colder on the launch day. You can see the actual revelation here:



How did the drama do? Pretty well. William Hurt did a great job of looking like the ill and ageing Feynman (though for some reason he didn't attempt Feynman's pronounced New York accent - I don't understand why, this grated for me throughout). Joanne Whalley was underused as his distinctly Yorkshire third wife. But the whole thing was lavishly done, looked great, and got the message across well. If it was rather 'Feynman v the world' this is how he presented it himself.

Because I ought to say that Feynman was a great story teller. One of the reasons he is so loved is his superb collection of tales from his life on the Manhattan Project, Surely You Are Joking Mr Feynman? It's here we learn of his rebelliousness, regularly breaking into safes and secure filing cabinets to demonstrate their weakness. However, it is widely accepted that these stories have to be taken with a pinch of salt. They are brilliant stories, but may have been embellished. And the Challenger line is very much based on Feynman's own account (in What Do You Care What Other People Think?). Does it make the whole thing untrue? No. And it's wonderful storytelling, with significant elements definitely true. But like all personal stories we need to be a little careful taking it as accurate history.

Do see the programme if you can. It's excellent. Enjoy it. Accept it mostly - but do apply the same sceptical scrutiny that Feynman himself would certainly have applied.

* When I say -40, you may be wondering if I am talking Celsius or Fahrenheit. The answer is yes.

Comments

  1. Brian

    Thank you for pointing out this programme; I've just watched it on the iPlayer and your comments are well made. I used the accident and the commission's findings for several years afterwards in one of my lectures about risk management and fraud and the need to look carefully at the Human Factors involved in the design of organisational systems, especially those which have been found to fail.

    Ian

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks Ian - yes, it's a good point about the human factors. (And thank goodness for iPlayer).

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why I hate opera

If I'm honest, the title of this post is an exaggeration to make a point. I don't really hate opera. There are a couple of operas - notably Monteverdi's Incoranazione di Poppea and Purcell's Dido & Aeneas - that I quite like. But what I do find truly sickening is the reverence with which opera is treated, as if it were some particularly great art form. Nowhere was this more obvious than in ITV's 2010 gut-wrenchingly awful series Pop Star to Opera Star , where the likes of Alan Tichmarsh treated the real opera singers as if they were fragile pieces on Antiques Roadshow, and the music as if it were a gift of the gods. In my opinion - and I know not everyone agrees - opera is: Mediocre music Melodramatic plots Amateurishly hammy acting A forced and unpleasant singing style Ridiculously over-supported by public funds I won't even bother to go into any detail on the plots and the acting - this is just self-evident. But the other aspects need some exp

Is 5x3 the same as 3x5?

The Internet has gone mildly bonkers over a child in America who was marked down in a test because when asked to work out 5x3 by repeated addition he/she used 5+5+5 instead of 3+3+3+3+3. Those who support the teacher say that 5x3 means 'five lots of 3' where the complainants say that 'times' is commutative (reversible) so the distinction is meaningless as 5x3 and 3x5 are indistinguishable. It's certainly true that not all mathematical operations are commutative. I think we are all comfortable that 5-3 is not the same as 3-5.  However. This not true of multiplication (of numbers). And so if there is to be any distinction, it has to be in the use of English to interpret the 'x' sign. Unfortunately, even here there is no logical way of coming up with a definitive answer. I suspect most primary school teachers would expands 'times' as 'lots of' as mentioned above. So we get 5 x 3 as '5 lots of 3'. Unfortunately that only wor

Why backgammon is a better game than chess

I freely admit that chess, for those who enjoy it, is a wonderful game, but I honestly believe that as a game , backgammon is better (and this isn't just because I'm a lot better at playing backgammon than chess). Having relatively recently written a book on game theory, I have given quite a lot of thought to the nature of games, and from that I'd say that chess has two significant weaknesses compared with backgammon. One is the lack of randomness. Because backgammon includes the roll of the dice, it introduces a random factor into the play. Of course, a game that is totally random provides very little enjoyment. Tossing a coin isn't at all entertaining. But the clever thing about backgammon is that the randomness is contributory without dominating - there is still plenty of room for skill (apart from very flukey dice throws, I can always be beaten by a really good backgammon player), but the introduction of a random factor makes it more life-like, with more of a sense