starship-design: Trash

[Timothy van der Linden <Shealiak@XS4ALL.nl>]

OK Guys, I've found a lucrative carreer.
 I'll become a garbage man. ;)

Timothy

               Boeing to Pay for Missing Station Tanks

	In an effort to avoid a potential public relations nightmare,
the Boeing Corporation said late Friday it, and not NASA, would pay
for a pair of missing pressure tanks intended for the International
Space Station.

	The two oxygen and nitrogen high-pressure gas tanks, valued
at a combined $750,000, were first reported missing by Boeing last
week when they were apparently inadvertently left outside a building
at Boeing's Huntsville, Alabama facilities and picked up as trash.

	Disbelief about the error turned into disgust when Boeing
officials said that NASA, and not Boeing, would be responsible for
the cost of any replacement units, under the terms of Boeing's
contract with the space agency. Late Friday, though, Boeing reversed
itself and said that it would reimburse NASA for the tanks,
regardless of the cause of their loss.

	"Boeing has offered to compensate NASA for the hardware, and
continue to focus on program objectives," said Joe Mills, Boeing ISS
deputy program manager. "As prime contractor we have a good track
record of properly caring for and handling government property, and
we are doing everything we can to resolve this issue."

	While both Boeing and NASA believe that the tanks were picked
up as trash, they don't know what happened to them after that.
Various reports have indicated that the tanks were either sold as
scrap or compacted at a local landfill.  Efforts to retrieve the
tanks from the landfill a week earlier failed to locate them.

	The tanks were originally meant to be spares for other tanks
that will be used to pressurize ISS modules.  However, a UPI article
cited NASA sources who said the tanks many have been used in a
propulsion module NASA was planning for ISS that would replace
delayed Russian components.

	A joint investigation into the incident should wrap up soon,
according to Mills.  "A Mishap Report, which documents the findings
and recommendations of a joint Boeing/NASA independent Incident
Review Board, will be formally released early next week," he said.
"Boeing already is taking corrective actions to fully implement the
recommendations of this Board."

[SpaceViews March 13]