Responsibility During The Challenger Disaster

The concept of responsibility in engineering as interpreted through the Challenger disaster can be further broken down into 3 areas: Obligation Responsibility, Blame Responsibility and Role Responsibility.

Obligation Responsibility:
During the challenger disaster obligational responsibility lay among both the engineers and management to not only follow standard operational procedure but also to exercise reasonable care. during the challenger disaster it was assumed that foam strikes were not a threat to the integrity of the shuttle’s hull and so, rather than exercise due care and have the foam strike investigated, management decided that there was no need to investigate the matter unless it was proved that foam strikes could be fatal. (rather