Cocaine Found At Kennedy Space Center

An anonymous reader writes "For the second time in the last two years, a stash of cocaine has been found at NASA's Kennedy Space Center. 4.2 grams of the a powdery white substance were discovered on March 7, and field tests by law enforcement officials confirmed that it was indeed cocaine. A spokesperson was unable to provide additional details about where the substance was found, or how many employees and contractors are now being drug tested. An investigation into a similar discovery in January 2010 yields no results after all 200 NASA employees and contractors who had access to the area in which the cocaine was found tested negative for the drug."

Comments

Zero hour, 9 AM

[Anonymous Coward]

And I'm gonna be hiiiiiiiiighhh, as a kite by then.

TSA involvement

[Binky_the_Zakalwe]

This shows a clear need for TSA screenings of all astronauts prior boarding.

Re:TSA involvement

[tgrigsby]

This shows a clear need for TSA screenings of all astronauts prior boarding.

"I have to take off my boots, too? OH COME ON, ARE YOU SERIOUS?!"

Blame Congress

[SJHillman]

It's the only way they could get anywhere high on the budget Congress gave them

Re:Traffic

[Yvan256]

Pepsi to retaliate on friday, news at 11.

Re:Impact on work performance?

[larry bagina]

It really depends on the person. Somewhere between 10-25% of coke/meth users don't get addicted and use it to self-medicate their ADHD or similar problems.

If you look at the history, cocaine wasn't banned because it was dangerous (back in the day, most housewives were taking it via mystery medicines). It was banned because people were afraid coked up negroes would rape their white women. It still has medical uses and is occasionally prescribed today.

4.2 grams?

[Weaselmancer]

The actual amount was probably about 2 pounds. You know how bad NASA is at imperial to metric conversion.

I, for one...

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

I am utterly shocked that a facility with a large concentration of people exposed to deadline pressures might be found to contain an alertness-enhancing recreational alkaloid stronger than caffeine...

That goes double if the NASA employee population skews a little older: children raised during/after Prozac and Ritalin became mainstream would be somewhat more likely to be expected to use some mixture of Provigil and one of the common prescription amphetamines for a mood and alertness boost, while powder cocaine is a venerable classic.

Re:I, for one...

[jandersen]

I am utterly shocked that a facility with a large concentration of people exposed to deadline pressures might be found to contain an alertness-enhancing recreational alkaloid stronger than caffeine...

The problem with cocaine is that it can have some rather devastating effects of your body - which isn't a good idea when you are out there, where not only you, but others depend with their lives on you.

On the other hand, isn't it becoming more and more clear that using recreational drugs is something people in general want to do? IMO, it would be a lot better if those in power recognised this and decided to allow the development and marketing of a set of drugs that offer what peolpe want with the lowest possible risk - and with clear, well thought-out guidelines about how to use them. It might even be possible to develop drugs that you could "switch off" quickly if you got into a situation where this was necessary.

Re:I, for one...

[Velex]

When Grandma down the street and that crazy guy whose kids won't talk to him anymore because of his batshit religious beliefs are the only ones who honestly believe in this superstitious delineation between "good" drugs (like celexa/paxil/prozac/caffeine/tobacco/alcohol) and "bad" bad drugs (like marihuana/cocaine (Freud used cocaine from what I understand)/psilocybin/salvia/exctacy (which was designed to be used in a clinical setting, only reason it's illegal is because it was being used on the street before FDA approval, so that ironically got it scheduled instead of approved, since anything that's used on the street can't possibly have any redeeming value))....

Anyway, it's a show of power, plain and simple. It's no different than the book burnings of old. It's a show of power. Big pharma would lose TONS if marihuana were accessible. We have medical marihuana here in Michigan, but from what I understand it's still a boondoggle, and the way the law is written, you have to find your own dealer and buy on the black market anyway, and law or no law, the feds can still go after you if they wanted.

Unfortunately, not enough voters in California got off their asses to legalize marihuana there (I know someone like that--wholeheartedly thinks marihuana should be legal, but couldn't get his ass to the polling station to vote, and if I could reach through the internet, he'd have black eye). So now we have to listen to shit from the right like, "See, the AMERICAN people don't want to legalize marihuana! See! See!"

This country isn't a fascism yet, but nothing will change if nobody votes for their principles.

Occam's razor

[dFaust]

Why is the assumption that the employees are themselves using cocaine? CLEARLY they're taking the coke to space. To sell to aliens. Sheesh.

DUh!

[Ozlanthos]

Someone who has it together enough to work at NASA doesn't have such a terribly bad habit that they are going to test dirty....Not going to happen. Although, if they'd found a bag of Cannabis, it would be a different story. The truth is that the only drug that you can detect more than 72 hours after total seccation of use via urine tests is Cannabis. THC can store in your fat for up to months after chronic use. Now, if they were really serious about busting the perp, they'd administer a hair test! Of course the cape would go dark for lack of employees shortly thereafter, but they'd have fired the idiot who left the stash....

-Oz

Is this really news?

[hawguy]

Thousands of people work at Kenned Space Center - wouldn't it be more surprising if no drugs were ever found there?

Employees: 13,500 (2008)

[seifried]

According to Wikipedia: Employees: 13,500 (2008) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedy_Space_Center). The national US average of cocaine us is reported as 0.5% or higher (multiple sources but the low end says around 1.5 million users in the US, assuming they are mostly adults that's at least 0.5%, probably more), so statistically speaking that's about 67.5 (assuming one of then only uses one nostril my numbers work =)cocaine users at the Kennedy Space Center.

LOL field test

[Hojima]

*snort*. Yep, it's coke.

Re:Let's get real

[Cajun Hell]

Racism was merely an excuse for the real goal: money.

It always is. Well, that's an exaggeration, but it usually is. For all the supposedly irrational haters out there (and ok, there are some), most of the time when I talk to a racist, I find out that it's really just an excuse to treat anyone else like shit for financial gain. They would stab their own race in the back too, if they only had a socially-acceptable cover excuse for it. "A nigger took my job" is code for "That job paid more than the effort that goes into doing it, and I had a damn good racket going on before competitive pressures made someone think." If fellow white-trash takes their job instead, they are just as furious, but don't have as easy of a way to put it into words as "a nigger took my job."

Assholes. They're not stupid; they're evil.