U.S. Customary v.s. Metric

"For all people, for all time."

-Motto adopted at the Treaty of the Metre Convention, 1878

"A miss is as good as a mile," but in the Mars Climate Orbiter's case, a mile wasn't very good. Lockheed Martin was supposed to be using kilometers instead of miles. The loss of the Orbiter may seem like a great loss, but the mess up with the Mars Climate Orbiter has given the people of the United States a chance to to turn to metric. After all, there are only three countries that do not use the metric system officially, and the United States is one of them. The United States was one of the seventeen countries to sign the Treaty of the Metre in. Now more than century later, we still do not use metric very much. We should all remember to follow the motto of the metric system that says, "For all people, for all time."

NASA already has a directive to use metric. Part of the the directive requires them to, "Cooperate with the private and public sectors to overcome barriers to use of the metric system and increase understanding of the metric system." The only problem is that the directive expires June 19, 2000. NASA needs to get its act together. U. S. Customary is still first and foremost in its papers, while metric is in paretheses. In otherwords, metric is second best, Metric should be in front. NASA needs to take the lead and show the people of the United States how simple metric is to use once you understand it.