July 28--Federal safety officials Tuesday blamed the builder of Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo for failing to anticipate the copilot error that caused the aircraft's disintegration during a test flight nine months ago.
The staff of the National Transportation Safety Board, at a meeting in Washington, initially listed the probable cause as copilot Michael Alsbury's premature unlocking of the space plane's "feather system," or movable tail.
That move set off a sequence of events that caused the spaceship to break apart seconds later above the Mojave Desert. Alsbury was killed; pilot Peter Siebold survived.
But after a discussion, the NTSB staff revised the probable cause, placing most of the blame on Scaled Composites, which had designed and built SpaceShipTwo for Virgin Galactic.
The NTSB blamed Scaled for failing to consider "that a single human error could result in a catastrophic hazard."
Both pilots worked for Mojave-based Scaled, which is owned by defense giant Northrop Grumman.
"Safety has always been a critical component of Scaled's culture and, as the NTSB noted today, our pilots were experienced and well-trained," Scaled Composites said in a statement. "As part of our constant and continuing efforts to enhance our processes, we have already made changes in the wake of the accident to further enhance safety. We will continue to look for additional ways to do so."
The NTSB also faulted the Federal Aviation Administration for failing to recognize that Scaled's hazard analysis had not adequately considered the possibility of human error. The board said the FAA had been under pressure to approve the SpaceShipTwo application within 120 days and had lacked communication with Scaled's staff.
SpaceShipTwo was more than 10 miles above the desert floor on an Oct. 31 test flight when it broke apart just seconds after firing its rocket engines.
The crash was a major setback for British billionaire Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic, which was created with the goal of ferrying wealthy tourists to the edge of space.
Investigators had already revealed that video taken from inside the cockpit showed Alsbury prematurely unlocking the spacecraft's movable tail.
Siebold survived after being thrown from the plane, still harnessed in his seat.
The NTSB findings likely will raise new expectations of safety for the nascent commercial space industry, requiring some of the routine cockpit technology present in jetliners to prevent pilot error from causing a catastrophic accident.
But such standards likely will increase the complexity and weight of the future spacecraft, along with their cost. All of those trends will weigh on the future success of what visionaries hope will become a robust industry of ferrying space tourists first to the edge of space and eventually into orbiting luxury space hotels.
"You always want to make your systems less expensive, but that is going to be a challenge in commercial space," said Marco Caceres, an aerospace analyst with the Teal Group. "Making them safe but not prohibitively expensive is a trade-off."
The Virgin Galactic spacecraft began on the drawing board of aerospace genius Burt Rutan, who had a stick-and-rudder approach to flying the craft. It put the hands of pilots, rather than computers or automated systems, on the direct controls of the craft.
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FOR THE RECORD
July 28, 3:46 p.m.: An earlier version of this article incorrectly referred to "the late" aerospace genius Burt Rutan.
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Alsbury moved a lever that unlocked the feather prematurely, allowing aerodynamic forces to rip it apart. The NTSB questioned whether the aircraft system should have allowed Alsbury to make such an error. Jetliners have largely automated such pilot error out of their systems.
"The question is whether this is too high a standard at this stage of the industry's development," Caceres said. "If it is too high, we do not allow the technology and the market to develop. It is not clear yet where that line is."
On the other hand, more crashes are likely to kill the industry just as quickly. Even thrill-seekers do not expect to die. Critics of the industry say it has tried to move too quickly, seeking to accelerate the start of passenger flights before all the kinks have been worked out.
Thomas Anthony, director of USC's Aviation Safety and Security Program, compares the problems facing the space industry with motorcycles. Owners know they are less safe than cars, but they still expect the brakes to work and the engines not to catch fire.
"We can expect more safety regulations on the industry," he said. "Safety is always a balancing act, even with commercial aviation."
Ken Baxter, a Las Vegas-based real estate investor who was the first to buy his ticket in 2005, said he still has every intention of going to outer space.
Baxter said he's met with the engineers and pilots of spacecraft and has "one hundred percent confidence" in their ability.
"I have no doubt in my mind that they will pull this off," Baxter said.
Ticketholder Bob Kulick, part owner of the Cici's Pizza chain, said he will not ask for a refund.
"This is rocket science, and there are so many moving parts in this," Kulick said. "It's a shame that it did happen. But I think it has been a wake-up call to everybody, and I think they will be that much more concentrated on the entire process now."
UPDATE
2:30 p.m.: This article has been updated with comments from aerospace experts and Virgin Galactic ticketholders.
10:21 a.m.: This article has been updated with comment from Scaled Composites.
10:01 a.m.: This article was updated with details, including the finding by safety regulators that the Federal Aviation Administration was partly to blame for the crash of SpaceShipTwo.
This article was originally published at 8:51 a.m.
