I don't get it. The Shuttle project included a lot of things that had never been done before. So things didn't quite go to plan and some people died? But in the mean time, it performed useful tasks.

Predicting failure is easy, because something will always go wrong. There hasn't been a perfect anything built yet.

What is also surprising about these dredged up past articles, is that they all invariable criticize the engine (SSMB/SSME), even though the engine was never a major issue. Yes, the rebuilds between flights took longer than expected, but it was the first ever re-usable engine and is still an amazing achievement.