My mistake!
Somewhere in outer space, waiting to be discovered by aliens or burn up on re-entry to Earth, is a 30lb tool bag which American astronaut Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper lost in November 2008.
What another civilisation would make of its contents is anybody’s guess. It contains two grease guns, a scraper, a garbage bag and wipes which she used during a seven-hour space walk to clean a solar rotary joint on the International Space Station.
Fortunately, she was able to share a second astronaut’s tools to complete the mission.
It wasn’t an expensive slip by space exploration standards, unlike the mistake that spelt disaster for the $125 million Mars Climate Orbiter which blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, in September 1999. It arrived safely at the planet but failed to go into orbit and was lost in space.
It transpired that the cause was a simple error – described by one observer as “the sort of mistake usually found in grade-school maths homework” – in the design of critical navigation software.
Flight computers on the ground did their calculations based on pounds of thrust per second but the spacecraft’s computer used metric system units. No one checked to make sure the values were compatible. Because of this, it approached the planet at too low an altitude and probably burned up. NASA admitted: “Processes that were in place were not followed.”
Britain’s mission to Mars was no more successful in December 2003 when its Beagle 2 Mars Lander separated from the European Space Agency’s Mars Express spacecraft and headed for the planet’s surface. No one knows if it got there safely because it was never heard from again.
The result of a subsequent enquiry was kept secret for seven months until a science magazine forced its publication under the Freedom of Information Act. The report revealed a range of problems that had been identified three years earlier by an independent review of the Beagle 2 programme.
Commissioned by the European Space Agency (ESA), it highlighted management failings and technical shortcomings. Having received it, ESA shelved the report and no further action was taken. Had it acted on the recommendations made, Beagle 2 may still be sending back useful information from Mars.
The obvious lesson to be learned from the planetary probe problems is that even the most basic elements of ambitious projects need to be checked and confirmed. Security and safety, as well as the success of multi-million pound ventures, depend on such principles.
Similarly embarrassing for the person involved, earlier this year, was the use of the wrong type of herbicide on the lush green hills of the 18-hole Haywards Heath Golf Club in West Sussex, England.
Instead of a mild weedkiller, an industrial-strength product designed for the “dessication of grassland” was used when the fairways were thoroughly watered in June, leaving the grounds littered with large brown patches.
Those incidents can probably be attributed to human error. But problems can just as easily occur when “the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing”.
That seems to be the case with the Hollywood Casino at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, US, which came up with a clever idea to promote its facilities to 1,000 elite customers.
In November 2008 it decided to reward these VIP punters for their loyalty with $100 in slot machine credits throughout December, plus two free visits to the buffet.
Unfortunately, somewhere along the line, the direct mail company got the impression that the vouchers were to be sent out to a wider customer base – 55,000 in total. That would have set the casino back $29 million if everyone took up the offer. It decided to partially honour the deal.
There are some schools of thought which suggest that making mistakes is good for us – part of the learning process. Ralph Nader, US political activist and presidential candidate, said it succinctly: “Your best teacher is your last mistake”. And US president Theodore Roosevelt famously proclaimed: “The only man who never makes a mistake is the man who never does anything.”
But we need to differentiate clearly between mistakes that are based on a judgment that is proved wrong – such as the choice of an employee or the development of a new product – and mistakes that are inexcusable because they expose laziness, carelessness or incompetence.
Every business should have in place very clear protocols for avoiding mistakes, including checks and balances and regular reviews of procedures. Above all, signs of weakness in, or failure to comply with, these systems needs to be investigated immediately and acted upon.
Those carrying out those checks might attribute the problem to computer error, which is presumably what led to a man in Malaysia receiving a phone bill in 2006 for $218 trillion. If they do so, don’t listen. Computers do as they are told, so if they are not producing the right results, someone has programmed them wrongly or input data incorrectly.
Perhaps the wisest words on making errors comes from Australian businessman Chris Corrigan, who admitted: “You can’t overestimate the need to plan and prepare. In most of the mistakes I’ve made, there has been this common theme of inadequate planning beforehand. You really can’t over-prepare in business!”
Surely the best advice, however, is to learn from other people’s mistakes rather than making your own.
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My mistake!
