16: Space Exploration Failures and the Lessons We’ve Learned From Them

For a space mission to be successful, there are thousands of things that have to go right; but for a space mission to fail, only one thing has to go wrong.   

In the sixteenth episode of The Sound of Space podcast, we discuss the causes and outcomes of well-known space exploration mishaps such as the Apollo 13 rescue, as well as the Challenger and Columbia shuttle disasters. We also discuss some lesser known failures attributed to things as simple as missing a hyphen in a piece of code, using mismatched calculation units, or even installing rocket navigation hardware upside down. Join us as we bring to light some the less proud pieces of space exploration history and learn about the changes that were implemented as a result.

Continue the conversation over on our Instagram account @_thesoundofspace or LinkedIn at The Sound of Space (TSOS) and let us know your thoughts on this episode!

University of Toronto Land Acknowledgment

TSOS is brought to you by the University of Toronto Aerospace Team (UTAT). UTAT is an interdisciplinary student design team with four technical divisions. Visit utat.ca to learn more!

CREDITS & TEAM

Hosts: Theodora Girgis, Ketan Vasudeva

Sound Engineer: Forrest McAdam

Marketing & Graphics: Bonney Wu

Research Team: Jillian Unruh, Lianne Choong, Sunyah Tehreem