About halfway down in the Health and Science section of today's Richmond Times Dispatch...
Nat http://www.timesdispatch.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=RTD%2FMGArticle% 2FRTD_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1031771819161&path=!news!health&s=104 5855935235 NASA again delays metric commitment Columbia disaster investigation leads to request for extension BY A.J. HOSTETLER TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Oct 30, 2003 In the aftermath of the Columbia shuttle accident, NASA has again delayed its timetable to committing to the metric system. NASA now says it will comply by Feb. 28 with recommendations from its Office of Inspector General, which audits and investigates programs inside the space agency. The deadline apparently was extended because of the effort in investigating the Columbia disaster and the related agencywide shake-up. "Due to other priorities, NASA has requested an extension," Madeline Chulumovich, the IG's executive officer, wrote in an e-mail. She would not elaborate further, referring questions to NASA. Agency spokeswoman Sonja Alexander did not respond to repeated inquiries. Three years ago, following the 1999 loss of the Mars Climate Orbiter over a metric mix-up, the Office of Inspector General issued a stinging report rebuking the agency for failing to adhere to its own metric policy. The report called for, and NASA agreed to, eight recommendations to avoid repeating a catastrophic mix-up between measuring systems. So far, NASA has implemented just one of the measures, using metric as well as English when communicating with the public. It had previously planned to put the seven remaining recommendations into place by Sept. 30, but now says Feb. 28 is the target date. NASA faces no formal penalties for not implementing the changes to metric, the preferred system in science and technology and in almost every major country. By law, federal agencies can avoid using metric when it is not economically feasible, but the Office of Inspector General concluded that not making the switch at NASA would be costly in the long run. NASA's pro-, but not exclusive, metric policy was instituted as a result of the 1975 Metric Conversion Act and its 1988 amendment, which required federal agencies to be metric by the end of the 1992 fiscal year. Despite official encouragement, conversion to the metric system remains piecemeal in practical terms throughout federal agencies. Contact A.J. Hostetler at (804) 649-6355 or [EMAIL PROTECTED] More Health & Science Top of page
