Today comes news that apparently on at least two occasions NASA sent a shuttle into orbit with a drunken astronaut onboard. I just find that to be unbelievable. There were a few occasions during my younger days when, after an evening of bar hopping, I drove home when I shouldn't have. I was lucky in that I never caused an accident or was nabbed by the police. But seeing how challenging it was just to drive a car, I can't imagine being in the same condition while taking the most complex space vehicle ever made into orbit. It certainly doesn't help NASA's image coming at a time when someone appears to have sabotaged a computer destined for the ISS, and this just a few months after another astronaut was arrested in Florida for just wanting to talk to a female competitor for another guy's affection (in this case the conversation would've included a knife, rubber tubing, a BB gun, pepper spray, and trash bags).
So I guess now the space shuttles will again have to be modified, this time with a breathalyzer that the astronauts will have to blow in before the shuttle will start up. Can you imagine the post-flight talk in the van that takes the astronauts away from the shuttle once it lands? "Oh man, we got so hammered this past weekend and we borrowed my dad's space shuttle. When I woke up the next morning everything was floating around and I was all like 'dude, what the f*$k?' and Chip blew chunks all over the remote arm control panel."
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