The spec sheet clears the tool, not the operator

A scene from a novel. Illustration, not evidence. Nothing in it is a finding. What it stands in for, and what it does not establish, is set out below.

"You ran gear off the frame with an unrated watch and no pilot standing by." It wasn't a question.

"The spec sheet cleared it for depth and load, I have it right here, I can show you the—"

"I didn't ask if the equipment was cleared. I asked if you were." Solá held out one hand, palm up, patient, the way you'd wait on a child to hand over something they'd been told twice not to touch. Bram didn't understand for a second what was being asked of him, and then he did, and reached into his jacket pocket and produced the small brass chip every one of them carried, stamped with the ship's hull number, and set it in the captain's palm.

The setup, from earlier the same chapter:

…and did not, at the time, register that a specification sheet clearing a piece of equipment for a task was a different thing entirely from someone clearing him to run it.

The same night, Bram's conclusion about what the find taught him:

…and that the only thing to do about it was pay closer attention next time to the part that wasn't on the spec sheet.