Yeah, this reads like two people defining happy path subtly differently: one is saying the happy path is anything within acceptable strictly defined mission par

Yeah, this reads like two people defining happy path subtly differently: one is saying the happy path is anything within acceptable strictly defined mission parameters and tolerances, the other thinks it is the sequence of steps that is expected to successfully execute the mission without ever encountering an exceptional situation (which is the conventional software view of the term), but there are exceptional situations which may be covered in the specification of the mission and so “on the happy path”. In the case the system strays outside mission success parameters then aborting could make sense. The question there looks to be if the success parameters were defined too narrowly - it sounds like an error in specification that prioritizes landing in the required area over the possibility of landing at all.