Originally Posted by
Robert Cooper
Nevil Shute, in his biography Slide Rule, also questioned Scott’s judgment concerning the final flight of the R101. He said “given that the R101 had never flown in bad weather and had undergone virtually no trials at all since being lengthened for the flight to Karachi, it appears reckless that Scott should have pressed on.” However, Shute did note that in the 1930s a pilot was supposed to be a daredevil and risk taker. It may be that by turning back Scott would have destroyed Lord Thompson’s political program.
Several sources however quote Shute as in the 1950s retracting much of that criticism - his explanation being that it was mostly inter-company rivalry, combined with sour grapes as he'd applied to the government team for a job, and been turned down.
In any case, Scott was neither the captain, nor the most senior person on board the R101, so arguably just a point in the chain of command. Large airship practice from 1914 to 1930 in the UK quite routinely had a separate captain and senior officer, the latter being rather like a flotilla commodore in the navy - setting policy but not managing the ship.
It is interesting to note that NASA used the R101 disaster as one of its Case Studies in System Failure. Their take on it is that the R101 Airship story is one of political leadership spurring investment in new technology, but at the same time driving that new technology to a premature implementation and subsequent disaster.
Could you give a reference for that?, as I'd like to read what NASA had to say on the subject, and particularly see when they said it. Several researchers have published on Challenger, showing it as a close copy of the R101 disaster, with NASA completely failing to learn the lessons of the earlier accident.
G