First, the good news. NASA announced today that future lunar missions will use the metric system, exclusively, for surface operations. Of course, there is no such broad restriction for non-lunar destinations, so this is an unfortunately small step for the agency. NASA has been slow to require metric-only designs, even after the loss of Mars Climate Orbiter, because of the rich tradition of American engineers using English units and the fact that so many labs would have to be retrofitted for metric-only. It’s true that there would be additional expense involved in making this conversion, but this cost would be offset by greater assurance that we are not omitting English-to-metric conversions, even in times of stress. In addition, the myriad partnerships with foreign space agencies and labs would be simplified by the use of a standard measurement system within projects and over the lifetime of a mission. Today’s NASA announcement is an important but by no means complete step.
Now the follow-up question. Do the national education standards now mandate teaching the metric system in our elementary schools?
