(2007-07-27) — A report in an aviation magazine that NASA astronauts have flown the space shuttle while intoxicated on at least two occasions was vehemently rejected by an attorney for the unnamed astronauts as “just another example of spacial profiling.”
“Astronauts are different than mainstream Americans,” said the unnamed attorney. “They look different, they dress different, they talk different…and because of the stereotypes, people discriminate against them.”
The alleged cases of LWI, Launching While Intoxicated, have brought intense media scrutiny to the already beleaguered space agency.
NASA insiders, none of whom would go on the record with their remarks, said they’re surprised that the incidents did not come to light sooner.
“The space shuttle was weaving in and out of the clouds, slowing down, speeding up,” said one source, “Everyone at mission control had his fingers crossed, and we’re just grateful that there’s not much to bump into at 70,000 feet. Those guys were at least three sheets to the wind.”
44 responses so far ↓
1 JamesonLewis3rd // Jul 27, 2007 at 6:49 am
God Bless America
2 Hawkeye // Jul 27, 2007 at 6:50 am
Funny stuff Scott… “spacial profiling”… “LWI”… Love it!
3 Hawkeye // Jul 27, 2007 at 6:53 am
I guess that brings new meaning to the term “spaced out”.
4 SnakeDoctor // Jul 27, 2007 at 7:13 am
Man oh man, I hate to see where NASA’S insurance rates are going to go now that this news has hit the fan. I guess they’ll really be high. It also gives new meaning to the line in the Air Force anthem, “Off we go, into the wild blue yonder, climbing high into the sky”.
5 SnakeDoctor // Jul 27, 2007 at 7:16 am
BTW, great stuff Scott. I started laughing as soon as I saw the headline.
6 RedPepper // Jul 27, 2007 at 7:20 am
First the whack job in the Depends™ , and now this!
In my day, astronauts were far more down to earth …
7 boberinyetagain // Jul 27, 2007 at 8:41 am
Isn’t that “spacial”???
Good stuff Scott…”weaving in and out of clouds”
I’d need to be drunk to sit on top of a billion pounds of rocket fuel and have someone light it up. I don’t blame them a bit
8 Darthmeister // Jul 27, 2007 at 9:09 am
I think I’m having a spatial hangover just thinking about this one. Now we know what all the barf bags in the Space Shuttle were really for.
From “Lost in Space” to “Looped in Space” … only in America. I mean, does anyone remember Major Nelson and Major Healey going into space while drunk? I’ll never be able to watch “I Dream of Jeannie” with the innocence I previously had since it has now been ripped away by the cold harsh reality of real drunken NASA astronauts.
I mean, I thought astronauts were larger than life heroes who had their own personal genies sleeping in a bottles and not having to worry about female astronaut suitors running around trying to off rivals out of sheer jealousy. What a increasingly diverse and complex world in which we now live. (sigh)
How I pine for the days when astronauts were honorable, dignified, self-controlled men whose love of their life was not hitting the bottle but rather the genie sleeping in a bottle! Is nothing sacred anymore?
9 Darthmeister // Jul 27, 2007 at 9:14 am
bober, I’m surprised you didn’t blame Bush for this. You know, all the pressures of living in a fascist country where the NSA is monitoring all the phone calls you’ve made to your fellow astronaut drinking buddies. A country in which there are real heroes that can be looked up to, an unrealistic neo-con concept which in turn has place too much emotional pressure and expectations of perfection on the astronaut corps. Gotta drown those sorrows somehow.
10 conserve-a-tips // Jul 27, 2007 at 9:24 am
You mean that when they saw those aliens, they were really just the equivilent to pink elephants??? Dang.
11 tomg // Jul 27, 2007 at 9:55 am
Must be time for a re-work of Jimmy Buffet’s “why don’t we get drunk [NASA crew]?”.
Guess they don’t let school kids talk to the astronauts in space anymore.
12 conserve-a-tips // Jul 27, 2007 at 10:01 am
Ya know…I don’t consider myself to be a spacial bigot, but I can pick those astronoauts out in a crowd. And I really don’t want them moving into my neighborhood. All they do is lay around in those shuttles and leave junk all out there, and they are totally dependent on the government for their welfare. They need to get a real job.
13 hwy93 // Jul 27, 2007 at 11:26 am
They Violated the 12 hour “Bottle to throttle” rule. You would think that 12 hrs before liftoff those guys would be kind of busy. And another thing, If the lady at the DMV has to pee in a bottle and give a hair sample to be qualified to tell me to “look in the machine and read line 2″, you would think that these guys might have to go through some sort of pre flight screening also. Of course they’ll never be able to prove anything. During a lanch there’s nowhere to pull over and do that thing where you walk a straight line and touch your nose.
14 Shelly // Jul 27, 2007 at 11:37 am
Too, too funny! Glad I wasn’t sipping my iced tea when I read this headline.
I have to agree with boberin on this one, and that is not satire.
15 Just Ranting // Jul 27, 2007 at 11:43 am
I didn’t know Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton were astronauts.
16 Just Ranting // Jul 27, 2007 at 11:48 am
Tang and vodka. It’s not just for breakfast anymore.
17 Darthmeister // Jul 27, 2007 at 12:52 pm
Interesting scoop, Just Ranting. After spending billions of tax dollars, the astronaut corps probably did develop a new zero-gravity mixed drink using Tang™, Vodka™, with a dash of rocket fuel. It’s probably called “Orbital Smash-Faced*” or something. Haven’t been able to Google it yet so it must still be filed under a black project program somewhere.
*Word changed to protect the innocent
18 Darthmeister // Jul 27, 2007 at 12:58 pm
I suppose thinking about the fact that NASA rockets are built by low-bid contractors is enough to cause some astronaut to want to imbibe the fruit of the vine beforehand - “Hey, what’s that crack in the bulkhead doing there?”
19 Darthmeister // Jul 27, 2007 at 1:03 pm
More interesting twists to the New Republic/Private Beauchamp scandal.
20 boberinyetagain // Jul 27, 2007 at 1:44 pm
Good point Hank, it seems more appropriate to get hammered before landing with your point in mind. By comparison liftoff is kinda safe
21 conserve-a-tips // Jul 27, 2007 at 1:48 pm
Darthmeister re: #19 ~ interesting. I believe there is a quote: “Ohhhhh, what a tangled web we weave…..” (said in the voice of Andy Griffith.
22 JamesonLewis3rd // Jul 27, 2007 at 2:25 pm
Ben Matlock as Andy Griffith: “WHAT!?!”
Jack Bauer as Kiefer Sutherland: “NOW!!!!!“
23 JamesonLewis3rd // Jul 27, 2007 at 2:37 pm
!! Off-Topic Warning !!
Here’s a little peep at the back story on the attorney-firing/burn-Gonzales-at-the-stake thing.
A little peep at why, perhaps, the Democrat party is going ape.
I can’t help wondering what a big peep might reveal.
24 RedPepper // Jul 27, 2007 at 2:39 pm
boberinyetagain #7: “I’d need to be drunk to sit on top of a billion pounds of rocket fuel and have someone light it up.”
I had the same thought, boberin.
I still have strong memories of both the Columbia and Challenger shuttle disasters, as well as foggier ones of the “Lost Moon” mission of Apollo 13, and the deaths (by fire) of Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee in the Apollo accident.
Chuck Yeager nailed it (in the 1983 movie, “The Right Stuff”), when he said, after the Mercury mission incident where Grissom’s capsule sank in the ocean: “Monkeys? You think a monkey knows he’s sittin’ on top of a rocket that might explode? These astronaut boys they know that, see? Well, I’ll tell you something, it takes a special kind of man to volunteer for a suicide mission, especially one that’s on TV. Ol’ Gus, he did all right. ”
25 boberinyetagain // Jul 27, 2007 at 2:42 pm
Amen Red
Give me a time when men were men and women were glad of it!
26 boberinyetagain // Jul 27, 2007 at 2:45 pm
And, I guess you’re right, take off/landing is kinda flip a coin as to danger. Heck sitting on the pad wasn’t safe.
But then, neither is driving to work, and I do that way more often then those folks take off or land. It’s all relative I suppose
27 Just Ranting // Jul 27, 2007 at 3:02 pm
That’s what happens when your space shuttle flight instructor’s name is Otis Campbell.
We aint had no decent rocket fuel ’round here the the Morrison sisters closed down the flower shop and Rafe Hollister quit moonshinin’ ‘n’ took up singin’ opry. Heck, even Aint Bea’s kerosene pickels don’t have no kick no more.
Food and water for my men and horses!!!!! OHHHhhhh!!!!! Dipsy dooddle tipsy dooooodlle…
28 JamesonLewis3rd // Jul 27, 2007 at 3:32 pm
You people mean to tell me that you haven’t noticed that Jack Daniel’s decal on the side there by the hatch?
29 boberinyetagain // Jul 27, 2007 at 4:07 pm
And, at least most of the time, I’m not drunk on my way to work.
30 conserve-a-tips // Jul 27, 2007 at 4:49 pm
Boberin: Which relative? Aunt Zinfandel or Uncle Jack?
James: I didn’t notice that sticker, but I did catch that the instrument panel was lit up like a Coors sign.
31 Darthmeister // Jul 27, 2007 at 6:16 pm
I guess having 20/20 eyesight in the astronaut corps meant being able to find that bottle of Morgan David 20/20 while in freefall on the darkside of an orbit.
Hollyweird should have titled that farmer cum astronaut film, Astronaut Farmer, “Boones Farm in High Orbit.”
32 camojack // Jul 27, 2007 at 7:46 pm
So, there’s more than one way to get “blasted”, eh?
33 onlineanalyst // Jul 27, 2007 at 7:59 pm
NASA must be falling down on the job if these space cadets were traveling mission uncontrolled.
Good link to the American Thinker piece, JL3.
Another OT in case anyone missed it: “How Politics Has Gutted the Surveillance Program” http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110010389
DrSanity.blogspot has a terrific piece on the relationship between sacrifice and worthy values.
34 MargeinMI // Jul 28, 2007 at 7:43 am
You folks are FUNNY! (With a extra special mention to tomg for #11-very clever!)
35 Darthmeister // Jul 28, 2007 at 12:03 pm
The Johnny Cochran (rest his soul) defense: “If there’s no vomit, you must acquit.”
The Las Vegas defense strategem: “What happens in orbit says in orbit.”
36 Beerme // Jul 28, 2007 at 12:16 pm
Is there any truth to the rumor that “99 bottles of beer on the wall” will replace the old style of countdown to liftoff?
37 EXT // Jul 28, 2007 at 1:22 pm
OMG!
I’m afraid this means Ted “Chappy” Kennedy gets to command the next shuttle mission!
Question: Would you let your daughter ride with him? Even in the back seat?
38 Ms RightWing, Ink // Jul 28, 2007 at 4:26 pm
I’m back and meaner than ever. It is so hot and humid here in the buckeye that you can jump off the seventh floor and swim to the parking lot. I just saw a nice walleye swim buy-to bad, he looked good.
Not to worry I have been reading scrapple every day but was unable to sign on.
39 gafisher // Jul 28, 2007 at 5:18 pm
Pity poor “Buzz” Aldrin, who’s suddenly back in the media spotlight.
40 Lawyer: Drunk Astronauts Victims Of ‘Spacial... - News [ Ectio.us ] // Jul 28, 2007 at 6:42 pm
[…] From scrappleface.com […]
41 conserve-a-tips // Jul 28, 2007 at 7:01 pm
Ms Rightwing, Ink! Welcome back. I’m sending you an email.
C-A-T
42 prettyold // Jul 28, 2007 at 8:49 pm
Oh ,what will ever happen ? All these years in the beer tent our local Polka band always plays, “In Heaven There Is No Beer”. Must these lyrics be changed ? Oh, woe!
43 Fred Sinclair // Jul 29, 2007 at 10:28 pm
Dream scenario - The Constitutional Party with President Duncan Hunter and his VP Mike Huckabee promotes everything found in the Constitution like with a bulldozer and his Constitutional Senate and House of Representatives defunds by 100% each and every current government program that cannot be found specifically authorized by the Constitution. Hey - “Dream scenario” O.K.?
Heirborn Ranger
44 Possumtrot // Aug 1, 2007 at 4:41 pm
I’m mostly drunk when I post here.
Just ask Liger, et. al.
My one faux pas about the presidenital election is proof positive. The candidates are running so ealy, I thought it was 2008 already.
If I had to go into the upper reaches and fly there on something designed and built by Soviet technology, I’d be drunk, too. I’d figure that’s my last day on Earth, in more ways than one.
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