Failure recovery for the Adaptive Matrix Worm (AMW) is a recoverability-doctrine problem, not an emergency-severance problem. Earlier framings of this canonical treated autotomy as the dramatic last-resort option in a binary recover-or-sever decision and treated polar/alpine temperature regimes as the primary mechanism-selection variable for self-amputation. Both framings miss the operational reality. Routine leave-behind is biologically grounded: 71% of major echinoderm classes are capable of autotomy, sea cucumbers in commercial fisheries are induced to eviscerate on scheduled cycles with > 95% post-event survival, and the brittle star Ophiocomella ophiactoides uses arm autotomy plus disk fission as its primary reproductive strategy. The AMW design follows the same pattern at different cost calibration. This paper recasts the v0.2 spine into two engineering decisions (D1 mission- state triage and recovery-mode selection; D2 recoverability economics and planned leave-behind doctrine) plus an embedded host-system protection priority hierarchy. The autotomy mechanism specification (M1 thermal-fuse primary, M2 mechanical-trigger universal fallback, M3 hydraulic-trigger research direction) is preserved with the temperature-driven decision framing removed. M1 is reframed as a commanded severance interface, not a climate-rated release device. The Mission Lifecycle Canonical's three-class AMW typology (Recoverable, Attritable, Sacrificial) supplies the architectural taxonomy on which the recoverability doctrine operates: Recoverable mandates retrieval; Attritable runs cost-benefit; Sacrificial designs leave-behind as the standard end-state. Bench Loop K, the Failure Recovery Cell, maps to Stage 5 of the canonical's five-stage staged-validation pathway and is the bench-scale instrument that exercises tube squeegee, NRL self-vulcanization under wet conditions, and tether-tension retrieval at canonical operational fidelity, with explicit a priori falsification criteria. The central claim: when installed infrastructure is worth more than the AMW, leave-behind is the rational terminal state, not a failure; when continued attachment threatens host AME integrity, severance is the rational decision, not a defeat; and when economics and mission state both favour retrieval, retrieval is the routine outcome. Recoverability is a doctrine, not a mechanism.
James Otto Danenberg (Thu,) studied this question.