A survey of
NASA astronauts and flight surgeons has turned up no evidence that U.S. spaceflyers were drunk on launch day and revealed a desire for more transparency in
how crews are selected for spaceflight.
The
anonymous survey, released Wednesday, did find one report of "perceived impairment"
in an astronaut in the days before liftoff, which was later was traced to an
interaction between prescription medication and alcohol, said former shuttle astronaut
Ellen Ochoa, NASA's deputy director of the Johnson Space Center in Houston.
In that
account, the astronaut was ultimately cleared for flight and launched into
space, agency health officials added.
NASA health
officials said that they did not know if the incident was one of two anecdotal accounts
claiming that a spaceflyer was drunk just hours before launch. The claims, one
related to a shuttle flight and the other to a Russian Soyuz mission, were
included in an independent panel review of
astronaut health released last year.
"We really
never understood from the beginning exactly what might have led to the comment
in the health care report," Ochoa said Wednesday. "We have tried to run it to
ground. We haven't uncovered anything. I don't know of any issues associated
with alcohol before flight."
NASA
regulations prohibit the use of alcohol within 12 hours of launch time. The
policy, initially an unofficial guideline adapted from its T-38 jet flight rules,
was officially adopted for human spaceflight last year. The agency's astronaut
corps is also putting the finishing touches on its own code of conduct manual,
Ochoa said.
NASA
commissioned the anonymous survey in the wake of a report last July by an independent
astronaut health review led by U.S. Air Force Col. Richard Bachmann, Jr., which
itself was spurred by the arrest February 2007 of the now former spaceflyer
Lisa Nowak. Nowak was charged with the attempted kidnapping and burglary
with assault of a romantic rival for a fellow astronaut's affections. She has
pleaded not guilty and her attorney plans to pursue a temporary
insanity defense.
Bachmann's
review panel reported some accounts of astronauts and flight surgeons who felt
their concerns over the anecdotal drinking claims were disregarded by their managers.
But in the
new survey, those polled indicated that astronauts and flight surgeons had a
healthy relationship, and were unafraid to bring up safety concerns with their
superiors. The survey polled all 31 of NASA's current flight surgeons and 87 of
the 98 active astronauts between August and December of last year.
"The
response rate of the survey was 91 percent, a rate well above what you would
normally expect in a survey," Ochoa said. "That indicates the seriousness with
which astronauts and flight surgeons approached this survey."
One
recurring theme among astronauts who took the survey was the desire for a
better understanding of how feedback on a spaceflyer's technical skills or
performance is affects career decisions and crew assignments, space agency
officials said.
"We have taken
their opinions and recommendations and are formulating the way forward on this
issue," Ochoa said.
The data
culled from the new survey will allow NASA to better monitor the health needs
of its astronaut corps, she added.
"We kind of
think of the human as one of the critical systems on board the spacecraft, and
just like we try to assess the performance and reliability of any system, we
need to do that with the humans on board, too," Ochoa said. "They are critical
in carrying out the mission of whatever it is that we are trying to do."
Meanwhile,
members of Congress said NASA must still remain vigilant to address the
concerns raised by Bachmann's independent panel, and any new items stemming
from the recent survey.
"While the
anonymous survey released today provides some useful data, NASA's action plan
for addressing the problems identified last year is still unavailable," said Congressman
Mark Udall (D-Colo.), chairman of the space and aeronautics subcommittee, in a
statement. "NASA needs to provide that plan expeditiously if Congress is to be
confident that NASA is serious about dealing with concerns raised by Col.
Bachmann and others, and I intend to press NASA to do so."
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