Shuttle, Houston: My Life in the Center Seat of Mission Control

by Paul Dye

Yes, there were immense risks. Over the span of 135 missions we lost two Shuttles and their crews. These are very poor odds when you compare them to the safety records that we expert of modern transportation systems. But space transportation today can’t be compared to the safety records of airliners, or ships, or any other type of terrestrial transportation. The energy involved in going to space is a couple of orders of magnitude greater, and therefore the risks are much harder to contain. Besides, those safer modes of transportation have millions—or billions—of miles behind them. Many lessons had been learned along the way, leading them to be incrementally safer all the time.