Space shuttle astronaut arrested at OIA on attempted kidnapping, battery charges

Orlando Sentinel ^ | February 5, 2007 | Henry Pierson Curtis

[burzum]

A NASA astronaut is charged with attacking her rival for another astronaut's attention early Monday at Orlando International Airport, the Orlando Sentinel has learned.

Lisa Marie Nowak drove from Texas to meet the 1 a.m. flight of a younger woman who had also been seeing the male astronaut Nowak pined for, according to Orlando police.

Nowak -- who was a mission specialist on a Discovery launch last summer -- was wearing a trench coat and wig and had a knife, BB pistol, rubber tubing and plastic bags, reports show. Once U.S. Air Force Capt. Colleen Shipman arrived, Nowak followed her to the airport's Blue Lot for long-term parking, tried to get into Shipman's car and doused her with pepper spray, according to reports.

[JSteff]

"Terminate NASA, and start fresh in a year or two; after they have sorted all of the Federal driftwood out of the system."

Yeah, turn it over to private enterprise. Burt Ruttan and Paul Allen spent far less than nasa and got a man in space.

They got further than nasa did on it's first million. Where would they go if they had nasa's budget?

[JSteff]

"At least this didn't happen ON the shuttle..."

I am sure lifetime will make up a better story (mocked and sexually harassed by the other male astronauts) and have it on TV in under six months. The story will be slightly different but only for cinematic reasons.

The picture will be adjusted to tit on your TV screen.

[LibFreeOrDie]

"The picture will be adjusted to tit on your TV screen."

Freudian slip? ;^)

[Hodar]

Where would they go if they had nasa's budget?

IF this happened, not only would we have a Mars base, we'd be much, much further along technologically than we are now. Consider, when NASA was first started, and NASA not only had the funds to hire the best, but the best and brightest competed for each spot - our technology advantage shot ahead of the world. We've been coasting ever since Apollo.

[JSteff]

"You kidding? I bet a bb sized hole can rapidly deflate a pressurized suit!"

At the airport?

[JSteff]

"If an astronaut can go into politics, it proves there is no limit to how far they can fall."

Yeah, makes me wonder what is in the dark side of John Glenn's closet.

[Texas Mom]

Her booking picture looks like this because she was traveling in disguise,including a wig..

[JSteff]

"That explains the whole thing. :) LOL"

Yeah the ROTC types are a bit more grounded in reality.

[Texas Mom]

I wish it was. This story is really going to hurt NASA.

I doubt it.

[JSteff]

"That has meth junkie all over it. If she took out an ad in the nespaper saying, "I'm a meth junkie", it could be more obvious."

Then again... if she had not been sleeping for like a week, was her time of the month, had not eaten for that whole month, and had missed the diaper early into the trip...

[JSteff]

"William Oefelein"

Sounds like the name of future news reader on MSNBC.

[JSteff]

"Give her a break, it's probably her time to leave."

NASA or the earth?

[JSteff]

"screened thoroughly in the Air Force"

That explains it. She is in the NAVY.

[JSteff]

LOL! Exactly

I couldn't figure out why she looked somewhat familiar in a washed up star sort of way.

[JSteff]

"is why this cannot be convictable attempted murder"

Yeah but some cop can say he arrested that homocidal astronaut.

[gcruse]

bookmark

[JSteff]

Yeah, but a CEO does not take the job knowing he has a 1 it 50 or so chance of dieing in a flaming wreck televised for the world to see.

CEO's just get their multimillion dollar severance package and use of the corporate jet to fly home on.

[JSteff]

That is why I said that. Private enterprise founded America, gave us the refrigerator, the car, the home computer (and CPU's much faster than the government ever did), body armor, airplanes, peanut butter, and soybean oil.. in short almost everything.

All were achieved at costs far less than the government could have done. (Except nuclear power which would have cost less if P.E. had done it.)

[JSteff]

LOL Curiosity?

[r9etb]

So, where am I wrong? I see nothing regarding an impulse bit. Yet, you proceed to argue a point that is categorically defined by your own sources.

Unlike you, I actually read further in the report. The units in question were pound-seconds vs. newton-seconds, used in impulse bit computations. From Page 13 of the report:

On September 29, 1999, it was discovered that the small forces DV’s reported by the spacecraft engineers for use in orbit determination solutions was low by a factor of 4.45 (1 pound force=4.45 Newtons) because the impulse bit data contained in the AMD file was delivered in lb-sec instead of the specified and expected units of Newton-sec.

I have made absolutely no mistakes in either my statements...

Since the units in question were absolutely NOT units of velocity, as you continually and incorrectly state, you have made at least one mistake.

Your other mistake is in stating that this failure means that NASA -- all of it -- is incompetent.

Nobody denies that this failure was a royal f***-up. The MCO incident report makes that quite clear. And yet the fault lies not with NASA in its entirety, but rather with JPL's cavalier approach to the mission operations. There was nothing wrong with the vehicle itself, nor the infrastructure which supported the mission.

And unless you REALLY want to claim that hugely successful missions like Hubble, Cassini, and the Spitzer telescope are also examples of NASA's "incompetence," one must conclude that your emotions have simply got the best of you.