FAA Proposes $633,009 in Civil Penalties Against SpaceX | Hacker News Reader

FAA Proposes $633,009 in Civil Penalties Against SpaceX

faa.gov

29 pointsryzvonusef26 comments

    > In May 2023, SpaceX submitted a request to revise its communications plan related to its license to launch from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The proposed revisions included adding a new launch control room at Hangar X and removing the T-2 hour readiness poll from its procedures. On June 18, 2023, SpaceX used the unapproved launch control room for the PSN SATRIA mission and did not conduct the required T-2 hour poll. The FAA is proposing $350,000 in civil penalties ($175,000 for each alleged violation). 

    > In July 2023, SpaceX submitted a request to revise its explosive site plan related to its license to launch from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The proposed revision reflected a newly constructed rocket propellant farm. On July 28, 2023, SpaceX used the unapproved rocket propellant farm for the EchoStar XXIV/Jupiter mission. The FAA is proposing a $283,009 civil penalty. 

    > SpaceX has 30 days to respond to the FAA after receiving the agency’s enforcement letters.

These are routine Falcon 9 launches, not starship.

Government agencies need SLAs. If FAA does not respond to the revision request within X days, it should be considered approved.

Governments have a long history of using delay as a weapon. This is why the founders included right to a speedy trial. Obviously that doesn't apply here as it is not a criminal prosecution but it shows that this was a known mechanism for corrupt governments to abuse their power.

> If FAA does not respond to the revision request within X days, it should be considered approved.

I don't think that sort of process is good for anything involving safety. The safety of the general public should trump all here.

Look at the Boeing situation and tell me with a straight face that less oversight plus automatic approval on deadline exhaustion would have helped there. If anything, it would have been worse.

For things not involving safety it's not a terrible idea.

> The safety of the general public should trump all here

An SLA is not unreasonable nor counterproductive to that end. Courts do this all the time.

It is both unreasonable and counterproductive here.

We have to ask ourselves, "Why is the FAA doing what it's doing?". Despite most of the complaining I'm hearing, the role of the FAA isn't to be a startup destroying killjoy that just wants to entrench the existing players. There are legitimate concerns for safety here, especially in commercial aviation and space travel, and those safety issues ought to wait for a proper review.

This is a clash between "growth every quarter" and "people not in graves because of pursuit of profit and damn the consequences", and I would rather have the latter than the former.

The issue on the other side is that the FAA has no incentive to move quickly. There is no negative consequence to FAA officials if they sit at their desks, shuffle papers around (with minor revisions or changes in approvals in each draft), and complain about being understaffed. In fact, that is the best thing for them to do, as they’re likely to get a bigger budget and more staff if they complain a lot and delay approvals; then they can keep doing the same thing again.

Then don't work in a regulated industry. I don't know what to tell you.

Is there any evidence of the FAA doing this - sitting on applications that they otherwise should process?

>Is there any evidence of the FAA doing this - sitting on applications that they otherwise should process?

Leaded avgas replacement is one such example. Pretty much every step was like pulling teeth.

Required ADS-B and collision avoidance tech is another. Many lives could be saved, instead they mandated fire extinguishers in all planes which have likely saved zero lives.

You can look at the incentives from the other direction: we probably don't want a system where any FAA regulations can be effectively repealed simply by lobbying Congress to not increase FAA funding as needed. If the FAA can't or won't do their job properly, the fix should take the form of positive action from higher levels of government, not a passive fail-deadly default.

Not only that, it incentivizes applications to be as dense and technical as possible instead of as clear and understandable as possible as a way to burn down the time that the FAA has to review something so their review is incomplete.

We cannot, should not, and dare not let a long application process allow applicants to side step review by abusing the process.

Thinking that a process is unfair or inconvenient does not grant one the right to break laws intended to protect people.

Safety is the by product of a well run system that can incorporate lessons learned

Faster, efficient systems are demonstrably safer

The MEP program for Value Stream Mapping has a ton of evidence on this across many industries

> I don't think that sort of process is good for anything involving safety. The safety of the general public should trump all here.

All the more reason for them to respond in a timely manner. If they're struggling to keep up with enforcing safety regulations I think we need to streamline the process, get them more funding or both.

The only thing you would accomplish by that is an auto-reply rejection without content, or a last minute rejection with “couldn’t approve within deadline so rejecting”.

Surprisingly to everyone the problem in this scenario is Elons Musks blatant disregard for the rules, not the fact that the rules don’t bend to his will fast enough.

They very much do have to respond within X days as determined by law. If the application takes more than 120 days they must inform the applicant what the issue preventing approval is and they must issue a determination by 180 days [1]. Crazy to think that the people writing this stuff might sometimes have already thought of that idea from HN commenter #3937408.

> If FAA does not respond to the revision request within X days, it should be considered approved.

this is obviously absurd and completely ripe for abuse. Regulations are intended to protect the public interest, the government failing its duty in one aspect (timeliness) doesn't void its duties to public health and safety, protection of property, national security, etc.

[1] see section C and 413.15: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-14/chapter-III/subchapter...

IIRC SpaceX has gone on record asking for a massive increase in the FAA budget so that the FAA can process SpaceX submissions & requests in a timely fashion.

If the fines go towards hiring a couple more FAA personnel, SpaceX probably would be thrilled to pay the fine. Other than the optics, of course.

Seems low enough to become a cost of doing business rather than a deterrent.

It's a deterrent, as repeated violations can result in a lawsuit with court ordered restraints on activites

It's not meant to put them out of business, it's meant to show them that actions have consequences and to improve. FAA generally appreciates what SpaceX does.

I was going to say the opposite, it seems like something that should be an email, but they're turning into a half million dollar fine. It's a totally reasonable change, they were in the process of having it approved, but the FAA is alleging it was used before it was officially approved

Anything in engineering that involves using parts or processes that are not officially approved (unless there is an exigent need to do so and the parties involved in the exigency accept the risk) should be severely punished. I don't care who you are. If anything, the fines should be percentage based on revenue (not profit, revenue) to deter deep pockets from fucking around (and hopefully for the safety of everybody involved) not finding out.

Secondarily, if the FAA didn't do this they would be roasted for playing favorites with SpaceX.

So I haven't been fined or in trouble with the FAA so I don't know how harsh they do things. This could be normal. That said, my understanding of government fines is they are usually reserved for willful deceit or negligence. This sounds like there was 40 different forms to fill out, and the FAA doesn't have their T-2 poll because SpaceX thought it wasn't part of the launch procedure anymore. A T-2 poll is done 2 minutes before launch to check and make sure everything is in order, but there is also a T-2 and T-4 hours check, plus a T-60, T-10, and T-0 poll, in addition to unofficial checks.

IMO what should have (or what usually would happen) is after the first launch, someone would have said "where's the T-2 minute poll?", then they would have realized the FAA didn't approve the T-2, and this would have been resolved. What instead happened was a number of launches occurred, and nobody cared because it wasn't important. Then someone in the FAA saw they didn't have the approval form, and decided to move to a fine. This could be normal, but it seems like this should have been an email.

> my understanding of government fines is they are usually reserved for willful deceit or negligence.

Having a process that allows unapproved changes to go through three times in two launches without confirmation is negligent

> This sounds like there was 40 different forms to fill out

They aren't getting in trouble for filling out the forms wrong. It sounds more like SpaceX knew exactly what to file and did so, and that the problem was not waiting for an approval.

> FAA doesn't have their T-2 poll because SpaceX thought it wasn't part of the launch procedure anymore.

You're breezing over the fact that they also controlled the launch from a brand new and unapproved control center.

> What instead happened was a number of launches occurred, and nobody cared because it wasn't important.

you gotta rtfa man, there were 3 violations across two launches with no overlap. We don't know how the FAA noticed, but they did so within a single launch on all counts.

Would be great to hear from someone actually in the space industry: is this reasonable? Given it's related to Elon Musk, everyone (including me) has a knee jerk opinion.

SpaceX is the new Boeing.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com