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NASA Fires Astronaut
davidwr writes "In an unprecedented move for an unprecedented situation, NASA has fired now-former astronaut Lisa Nowack. She is facing charges of attempted kidnapping related to an incident earlier this year. Ms. Nowack is a Navy officer and remains so."
listening to her side of the story?
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In an unprecedented move for an unprecedented situation, NASA has fired now-former astronaut Lisa Nowack.
It's not completely unprecedented. They fired the Challenger crew. I guess they just couldn't keep it together.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
Okay, I guess technically they've never fired an astronaut before, so it is "unprecedented" in that sense.
But it's not like it's unusual to fire someone who is incapable of doing the job you hired them to do.
Sensationalism at its "finest".
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
http://slashdot.org/firehose.pl
One question about this whole thing that has bothered me is that she wore diapers to obviate the need for bathroom breaks. She drove 900 miles really fast, which meant she also had to refuel. Assuming great mileage, a large fuel tank, and a speedy car, she had to stop at least twice to gas. I'm not sure how much time would've been saved by stopping off in the loo. I think it tends to show more of how batty she is- which is good for her defense. Has anyone seen how long the trip actually took for her to drive?
Navy has low standards.
It's not like this is strange. She's under investigation for a felony... I'm pretty sure that disqualifies her from flying on the space shuttle. If not that, the fact that she's a certifiable whackjob.
As for her remaining a Navy officer, I suspect she'll get a second (please forgive the pun here) dishonorable discharge after the dust settles.
No, they fired Lisa Nowak. I know this is Slashdot, and I'm not new here ... but Christ, is it that hard to do a little basic spell-checking?
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
Wow. Now her life is completely destroyed. Way to go, guys. Presuming she doesn't go to jail or a mental institution, you couldn't have found somewhere for her to work at NASA, given how big NASA is? Or waited until she was proven guilty, at the least?
Especially since it's your training program that caused the breakdown in the first place, most likely?
Talk about getting tossed out an airlock. NASA could have taken the high road on this one, and it's pretty obvious they took the easiest-for-them road. Circle the wagons, protect the budget.
Sends a real clear message to the other astronauts/candidates, though.
Please help metamoderate.
When you're under investigation, or at least in the movies, they tell you not to leave town. Perhaps they just don't want her leaving the planet.
"A government is a body of people, usually notably ungoverned." - Shepard Book Quoting Malcolm Reynolds
I figured she already had been fired. Has she even denied the charges?
Libertarian Leaning Political Discussion Forum.
Oefelein told investigators he and Nowak both served on the bicycling team at NASA... Man, I know NASA is strapped for cash, but bicycles?
Canada's Female astronaut has 'not' committed crimes or had a need to be fired.
Innocent until proven guilty! So much for that belief. Eh?
NASA could have been kinder. Whatever her situation, losing her paycheck isn't going to reduce the stress on her or help her recover.
How's NASA going to look if it turns out that her bizarre behavior was the result of something like a brain tumor?
Can't even imagine what her kids are going to make of it all.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
Flying helicopters. In Anbar province.
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
"Has anyone tried listening to her side of the story?"
has anyone tried to listen to it without laughing... thats the hard part.
What I love about this story is she gets aaa wig, everything you need to kill and torture someone, drives forever to meet her... and the weird part is diapers that isnt weird for her or her job... like none of that other stuff bothers anyone.
Clearly, we are desensitized to murder and all that... but adult diapers really gets us.
There's nothing Intelligent about Intelligent Design.
How many companies *won't* fire you if you're arrested for a felony?
Granted, they'll probably fire you for the unexcused absence from work, but still...
She was shuffled over to another job, it's just that it's a Navy position rather than another NASA one. That's because she doesn't work for NASA. She officially works for the Navy and was assigned to do astronaut detail for NASA.
Only on slashdot would you have someone question the logic of a nutcase wearing diapers in order to avoid taking bathroom breaks.
I think the invisible hand of the market has its middle finger extended
--A wise old fart named SC0RN
Should you get fired from your cashiers job just because you got fined for speeding?
sure, kidnapping is a more serious event, but the two are just as much unrelated.
That said... I'm pretty sure that NASA doesn't allow anybody with a criminal record on their astronaut staff, and so wouldn't have a choice.
Keep in mind that she's an astronaut. They're used to having to use... unusual accommodations for basic needs such as this for a mission. You know - you can't really take off your suit when you've got to go. So I assume that it's a holdover from her space training.
cosmonaut fires YOU!
I find that it's the "Flamebait" mod that changes it from "wrong but funny" to "wrong but hilarous".
Yeah, I guess some people are still pretty broken up over the whole Challenger thing.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
...is that even though NASA can't afford the search for the killer asteroid, they can apparently afford the search for the killer astronaut.
I have discovered a truly marvelous
Nowack? More like Yeswack.
They're custom-made from Lockheed Martin, spent 8 years in development each at a cost of $650 million, use military-grade titanium frames and have wheels made up of 65,000 tiny sheets of vulcanized rubber which are handmade and then painstakingly knit together to best resist wear-and-tear with the road. They're only used for serious scientific business, like carrying a mouse in the basket to see what the physiological changes are to a mouse riding a bicycle. It was determined that the changes are rather similar to what a mouse experiences in low-gravity: not much, and if you give him cheese he really couldn't care less.
Plans to retest using a hamster and sunflower seeds were scrapped after the bike was totaled in a training accident. (A NASA bicycle rider on loan from the Air Force attempted to take the bicycle over a 3 inch curb, which should have been within the 5 inch tolerance level of the suspension. Unfortunately, one of NASA's subcontractors designed for 5 cm tolerance level instead, and after the suspension exceeded tolerance it folded like only a $600 million can can.)
NASA is now submitting a proposal for a better, more expensive bicycle to continue their important scientific mission. $1 billion is slated for testing the suspension under a variety of stressful conditions, and as much as $2.50 is slated for experimental apparati for measuring the responses of the hamster.
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
Better question: Would you let somebody with obvious mental instability babysit your $1.3 billion kid?
...out of a cannon, into the sun.
She had to go. Were it the NBA, they could have just fined her, or sent her to rehab, but.....
not reading the article is that you make your self look like a fool...in this case a particularly stupid fool.
She didn't actually work for NASA, she is a naval officer.
"Especially since it's your training program that caused the breakdown in the first place, most likely?"
not likely. It was probably many other factors. Like a failing marriage.
"NASA could have taken the high road on this one, and it's pretty obvious they took the easiest-for-them road."
No, NASA has no way to deal with this situation, so the said to the Navy "Here you go, you can have her back" so the Navy can deal with the legal issues.
"Sends a real clear message to the other astronauts/candidates, though."
It sure does, is says "If you are from the armed forces assigned to NASA and you commit a crime, we're going to send you back to the armed force branch you are on loan from."
It also says, "If you life is going to hell, talk to us about it so we can help."
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
...Into space!
Getting fired from the Federal Government is generally tough-especially if you are prior military. Unlike private industry, it requires TONS of paperwork, and/or an extraordinary event. You have to really fuck up to get canned. Typically, the way to deal with a problem employee is to promote them into another department or position-that is usually how it is done. This is one reason why the Federal Government has some seriously mismatched people in certain positions. Also, the closer you are to retirement, the less likely they will actually fire you. You can be marginalized, but you won't get fired very easily. Some branches of the military are cracking down on some bad behavior. For example, the US Coast Guard will fire you if you get yourself a DUI as a civilian, and if you are active duty you COULD get two DUI's (pending a board review) before being fired, but that's it. On the flip side, you could be a lazy bum and be a low productivity worker for decades, and probably make it to retirement while being paid moderately well.
The line of separation for GS positions typically stops at the GS-12 level-there are still some incompetent workers at the 13, 14 and 15 levels, but the numbers are far fewer, because at those levels incompetency and general specialist/management efficiency becomes blurred.
Note, there is a little hope on the horizon-the Federal Government IS though moving some jobs away from the GS classification into a new pay banding system that rewards you based on performance, but unions are suing to slow down the change over with mixed results. That's why some job postings say GS and others have the new classification. Under the new pay banding, the probability of getting fired doesn't change much, but it is harder to move up if you are a bad worker.
Just because you get modded "insightful" on Slashdot doesn't mean you actually are in real life.
NASA has fired astronauts before, people. Apollo 1, Challenger, Columbia... all "fired" for various reasons. /...17 in the ashtray
"A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --
GeneralEmergency
I agree that they should've at least waited until she is found guilty in court, but to lambast NASA for firing an employee who exhibited this behavior is ridiculous. She went crazy and tried to kidnap a person. The responsibility for this decision is Nowak's alone so to claim that anybody else is trying to destroy her life is absurd. NASA has no obligation to unconditionally accept any dangerous behavior from its employees and reposition them if they become unfit for their original assignments.
Got any proof of that?
Protecting the budget or other employees? You seem to be ignoring the fact that Nowak drove 900 miles in a diaper to try and kidnap a woman who was dating a man that dumped her. Imagine what she'll do to the bitch who borrows her stapler too many times and sits right next to her.
The fact that you got modded "Insightful" only shows that /. is populated by too many people with little/no real world experience.
She got off easy!
...and they've shown restraint. They didn't throw her out the Shuttle!
The asstronaut was an avid sportswoman. She played a lot of badminton. Apparently she was always trying to score with the shuttlecock ;-)
Thanks ladies and gentlemen... I'm here all week!
Libertas in infinitum
She is an Officer of the United States Navy. (And, yes, to people associated with the military, that means a hell of a lot.) When you're an officer, you get held to higher standards, because you hold in your hands the honor of the US military. It's well known and accepted that that includes your behavior off the clock.
When you're assigned to prestigious duty in the name of the Unites States of America, you better damn well be spotless, because you're holding the honor of the country in your hands.
And that's not even thinking about whether behaving poorly under emotional stress should disqualify you from things like spending six months in only a couple tens of meters of cubic space with other people. That kind of contact would drive normal people insane; Astronauts have to be more stable than a concrete slab.
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
Company fires Employee! ...
etc
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C1 bottles of beer on the wall. Take one down, pass it round... Oh, umm...
One of the officers I work with has coined a new phrase: "I've got astronaut love for you, man!" I can't being to express how wrong that is. Just wrong.
...to the phrase "Your mother's an astronaut!"
...welcome the new 'diaper' tag, and look forward to seeing it used more often on /.
Unless there's other factors (or you're found as 'alcohol dependent' in your first 6 months of active service'), nobody gets discharged for one alcohol incident. Discharge is only automatic after two 'alcohol incidents'* for officers. Enlisted personnel can go as high as three if they're otherwise clean.
Well, that's true in any branch of the military. As long as you (generally) follow orders as they are given, getting involuntarily discharged takes some serious work. (Although some branches have a 'up or out' up to a certain rank - if you don't make a particular rank by your fourth or eighth year, you won't be given the option of renewing your enlistment or commission.
*Although it's not just a DWI that counts as an alcohol incident. Any arrest involving alcohol, from a public drunkeness to a misdemeanor assault while intoxicated is an alcohol incident. As is showing up for duty drunk, drinking on duty... basically any misconduct where 'alcohol was consumed and was a significant causative factor in the misconduct.'
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
Imagine one of your friends or family member did something like she did. You can't really imagine it, right? That's what her friends and family now face, because she has done something so incredibly unbelievable.
It's a great sadness and tragedy to her family and friends, NASA, the world space program, and most of all, Lisa Nowak herself.
Let's hope she and NASA will learn from this lesson and wish that she will still have some hope for her future.
Why is it that if someone had a severe spinal injury which caused them to limp or drag their leg behind them evokes sympathy and potentially assistance on the street but if the brain is involved, where behavior suddenly changes involuntarily, they can be mocked and ridiculed in public?
Have some respect and sympathy for a person going through a very difficult time.
Q - Why are the dolphins off Florida so smart?
A - They have a new teacher.
Q - What does NASA stand for?
A - Need Another Seven Astronauts.
I went to the hobby shop and got a Challenger model. No assembly required - just toss the pieces in your full bathtub.
Q - What's worse than finding pieces of broken glass in baby food?
A - Finding pieces of astronaut in your tuna.
Get off your moral high horse. Gallows humor is an all-too-human response to terrible situations.
This can't be done, legally, because Capt. Nowak is a military officer. (As it says in the article, the reason NASA requested her transfer back the regular Navy is because they do not have the authority to use administrative measures against military members assigned to them.
This is actually pretty common in all things military. It doesn't take conviction of anything to remove an officer or enlisted person from a special position, like a commanding officer, executive officer, command representative, or even just a normal pilot. Even just being charged with something questionable usually results in the person being relieved of that position/command until the whole issue is sorted out. If they're found innocent, they might get another chance at it sometime later...
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
Selling nappies...
Haw haw...
Lisa Nowack
Click-click
Click-click
She's kooky and she's spooky, she's a NASA Astro-NOT!
Thank you, [bowing] Thank you
Technically, the closest bathroom would be on the shuttle, no more than 100 metres away.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Orf. majorly dissed them and is a totally selfish prick that doesn't love anyone but himself. Why doesn't he get any ink. Oh wait, the media is run by a whole bunch of selfish pricks who think what he did is OK.
Well, I don't know all the details on the active duty side of the house so well. I know for a fact that though that civilians can be fired over one DUI incident, because a contractor I know, just recently took a "drug and awareness" class, and he was telling me that how it's tough to get fired, it's not impossible. Contractors of course, can be let go at the end of the contract, if it is not renewed/refunded. They are getting tougher though for active duty folk concerning things like domestic violence, but not enough to fire you over it. I'll have to ask about officers versus enlisted staff though 'cause I hadn't thought about that difference...
Just because you get modded "insightful" on Slashdot doesn't mean you actually are in real life.
Well, wtf is NOWACK? Noone catch that? Its probably the most easy to pronouce for english speaking people polish surename, and still someone made this "nowack". lol.
I've actually handled wreckage of the Challenger.
Have you?
I thought not.
Trust me, it changes your perspective.
"A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --
GeneralEmergency
"I'd imagine that it takes very little in the way of strange behavior to disqualify a person for astronaut duty"
Like wanting to be blasted into space in an outdated craft stuck on top of a giant fuel tank?
Was it a three stage firing?
The middle aged, lifetime single, Silicon Valley engineers would like to know how Oefelein, in a world of 99% men, managed to get 2 heroines to fall over for him. Not counting the hundreds of others who swooned over him, that guy must be some kind of sexual genius.
The fact that he's the real life incarnation of Maverick doesn't cover it. Having a full head of mane doesn't cover it. It takes serious cash to impress nowadays but swabbies don't make nearly enough. Was it rocket exhaust #5?
Its the guy (the capitain) who couldn't keep his dcik in his pants. He's the one who ought to be fired for playing with women's emotions. Actually, that'll leave very few male astronauts in NASA.
"And I said, 'Is there going to be some crazy lady showing up at my door trying to kill me?' and he said, 'No, no, no, she's not like that, she's fine with it, she's happy for me.' "
Wow, that lady can see into the future :)
Yahh, hiii haaaaa! -Major Kong, from Dr. Strangelove
If you ever find yourself having irrational thoughts, emotional problems or any kind of mental health issue, DON'T TELL ANYONE. Keep it a secret. Do not seek help. Your career depends on it.
Thank you NASA for showing us how it's done.
And good luck finding humans without human frailties. I hear they hang out with the unicorns.
This is just the sort of BS Corpus Christi needs...I wonder if she'll be wearing diapers to catch it as she drives across Ward Island (where my office is) to get to the base.
Come on, I heard the "Need Another Seven Astronauts" joke about two days after the event in question.
Well, that is so you can drive non stop. Duh.
Please tell us the car that she drove that actually got 900 miles to a tank of gasoline. We want to know about it!
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
Just like that? I thought they first put them in a rocket?
Emphasis mine
-mcgrew
This sort of event is the reason I don't like mixed sex programs in things like the military and NASA. Weird stuff happens and focus gets lost. I had a reserve base near where I grew up and all sorts of intrigues had taken place there between the men and women. It never used to be like that. Five years ago I worked in a pub and watched the men and women getting drunk with each other. "These people will be trouble if they ever have to go to a war" I used to think to myself. When Iraq and the Abu Ghraib incidents happened I wasn't surprised to see it was male and female reservists doing such things while "entertaining" each other. Of course there were also things like Tailhook and the Air Force Academy escapades. Of course problems like this were predicted when women were used to break-up the male corps for political purposes so I don't blame the people involved as much as the eggheads who set the stage for such things to happen. Now the eggheads want to force the homo stuff on the military. Of course that won't last long since some collapse always follows that sort of degeneration.
I have:
* 18 months when we'll see a trial;
* 6 months between the start and the end of the trial;
* 10 years in prison, with five years probation;
* 5 years afterwards a private firm will hire her to fly their test spacecraft, or;
* 5 years afterwards she'll star on a reality TV series, or;
* 8 years afterwards she'll star on a reality TV series about trying to fly a test spacecraft.
Unreal? Amy Fisher, anyone?
Mod Karma -1: I sed bad wurds. If I cep my mouf shut, I wud be at riyses.
there is a LOT of competition for superior positions out there in the military. anything can blow your career up. if things are tight enough, sneezing in formation could do it.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
...you sir are an ENABLER of the highest order.
I commend you sir, you ENABLE people like no one has ever done before. My hat is off to you sir!
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
Some organizations would fire you immediately if you were arrested even if you are never convicted. NASA at least waited a few weeks for the details of the indictment to come out.
Maybe she was gonna reveal the aliens and had to be stopped. Nothing makes you look crazier than using adult diapers.
Bike racers of both sexes do it without stopping, and often without even pulling down their shorts. So do runners. I was helping with the Leadville 100, an ultramarathon 100 miles long, and can't tell you how often I saw people running and suddenly they were leaving wet footprints. At least bike racers (usually) have the civility to pull out of the paceline and let fly so you don't get a faceful of urine. And for that matter, it's better drafting someone who is taking a leak than someone who hit the pavement in an earlier crash, coz having bloody flecks from the guy ahead of you start appearing on your jersey makes you think about what you must be breathing...
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
Ready?
3... 2... 1... Ignition!
Yay! NASA Fires Astronaut!
Hivemind harvest in progress..
The dissolution we know as death happens to all living things. We all have to face it.
The real tragedy of Challenger was not about humans dying. It was about dreams dying.
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.