Paper Session I-C - Reliability and Safety Prediction Methods For Mission and Spaceport Operations

At KSC and other Space Flight Operations (SFO) NASA centers, a great deal of effort is expended to collect, analyze and report statistical data on performance of space vehicle systems during tests and operations. In all cases, an effort is made to mitigate the risk of failure and improve safety and reliability by finding systems that may benefit from some sort of corrective action. Statistical data summarizing performance of space vehicle systems can sometimes enable evaluation of the best possible type of corrective action to use, such as replacement versus redesign. However, complexity and time constraints of existing methods do not allow performing this analysis on every system for every test or operation. So current practice stresses isolation of the most vulnerable systems in order to perform more detailed analysis and corrective action, if necessary. Ultimately, the final decision for vehicle launch is based on testing that all vehicle systems are operating nominally, in the hope that all possible actions have been taken to ensure these systems continue to operate safely and reliably