A bipartisan group of U.S. House members from Texas wants the federal government to retrain the NASA space shuttle work force to carry out safety inspections of oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico.
The Houston Chronicle’s “Texas on the Potomac” blog reported July 19 that the 15 lawmakers, led by Rep. Gene Green (D), wrote to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Michael Bromwich, director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement, asking that they “look closely at these individuals for employment in this area.”
“As the space shuttle chapter of human space flight draws to a close, it is important that the hard working and talented men and women of the space exploration program find employment that utilizes their technical abilities and keen minds,” Green said in a statement. “The inspection of offshore oil and gas facilities requires these traits.”
