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How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks

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Kenneth Dalton Pangburn III
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
I don't believe this story one bit. I was an intern at NASA for 3 years. I worked at Kennedy Space Center and Lewis Research Center. KSC had extensive multi-leveled security. Just to get to my office i had to use 5 different badges (all with different levels of clearance). This was all pre 9/11 and the guards certainly didn't wave interns through. Most doors didn't even have guards. Different doors with varying security levels required various special badges. I worked with the Partial Payload Checkout Unit (PPCU), a system used to verify the data and electrical interfaces of space shuttle payloads before forwarding them to integrated testing and, finally, to the space shuttle orbiter cargo bay. This wasn't even close to the highest level of security and the antics described in this story wouldn't have gotten you halfway into my office. I call bullshit.
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Mr. Moto
05/06/09

@Kenneth Dalton Pangburn III: Google the names and you will see it is true.
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Brian Lam
05/06/09

@Mr. Moto: kenneth dalton is questioning the heist details. I do too, that's why we made a disclaimer. The guy is a criminal. not the most reliable ource. But he DID steal these rocks. The how of how he did it is totally questionable, though.
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OMG! Ponies!
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
The lesson is "Don't steal anything until you have a buyer."
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Kaiser-Machead
05/06/09

@OMG! Ponies!: I'm amazed that many an egghead just don't take Fence Rule to heart.
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/06/09

@OMG! Ponies!: I wonder if a certain NASA computer terminal had a hand in this.....
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macabron
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
Don't all interns do the same?
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Kaiser-Machead
05/06/09

@macabron: Benny the Intern simply stole lots of dignity.
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DangerousDac
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
I think Im not the only one whos interested in a pic of Tiffany...

What? Your all thinking it.
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/06/09

@DangerousDac: She's the one on the right:

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Lite: hates Illinois Nazis
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
Didn't Mythbusters cover this neoprene suit vs thermal motion sensors bit already?
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/06/09

@Howlin' Mad Murdock...Lite: Yeah, but that was really dis-information put out by NASA. Mythbusters "proved" the moon landing was real, and placed it in the media that wetsuits don't fool motion sensors, and Adam got a REAL spacesuit, and Jamie got mustache wax that defies gravity reverse engineered from Area 52.
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Lite: hates Illinois Nazis
05/06/09

@HeldForRansom_GitEmSteveDave: Area 52? Isn't that where they invented the Big Mac's special sauce before adding two all beef patties, lettuces, pickles, and onions on a sesame see bun?
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/06/09

@Howlin' Mad Murdock...Lite: Yes, and Area 53 is where they added the most sinister(even more so than aglets) ingredient. The cheese.
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Kaiser-Machead
05/06/09

@Howlin' Mad Murdock...Lite: The Big Mac's special sauce is just a blend of liquefied horse tallow, thousand island dressing and the same compound used in the makeup worn by Ronald McDonald.

Area 52 is where they kept Dick Clark until it was determined that he's safe to release into the general population.
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/06/09

@Kaiser-Machead: Everyone knows he's an android and his "stroke" was the first confirmed attack of the Conficker worm.
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Pessimippopotamus
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
@AriellaDrury: It read like a horrible amateur fiction posted on some crappy fanfic forum. Am I the only one who thought it started off like some sort of space age smut?
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Kaiser-Machead
05/06/09

@Pessimipposaurus:
The triple moons were just rising over the horizon here on planet Hora, and my automated slavemaiden was disrobing for our morning canoodle

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Brian Lam
05/06/09

@Kaiser-Machead: love you, dude.
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/06/09

@Kaiser-Machead:

"In the morning I want them on the south ridge

working out those condensers", I commanded her.

"Already done, Sir. I am programmed to anticipate your needs. And I see a large matter of yours that needs attention right now", she said as she rotated the Fleshlight attachment forward on her manipulator arm.

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Kaiser-Machead
05/06/09

@HeldForRansom_GitEmSteveDave: Fool! You forgot the stargate attachment. All fleshlights in scifi must contain a stargate.
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Mandatory_Field
05/06/09

@Kaiser-Machead: Stargate attachment? To where? I dunno, man, that sounds like some kinda weird intergalactic glory-hole. Who knows what could be at the other end? I'll take my sci-fi fleshlight sex the old fashioned way, from the robotic slavemaiden, thank-you-very-much....
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/07/09

@Kaiser-Machead: What about the puddle vortex?
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frigg
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
So I get the part about Tony Almeida stealing moonrocks. But getting Chloe to help him... never saw that coming.
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Kaiser-Machead
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
I suppose he stole them with simple appreciation of where the rocks came from, as he'd obviously have an easier time selling a grilled cheese sandwich with the face of Nick Nolte, Jesus Christ or Joyce DeWitt burned into the nooks and crannies of the bread than selling what he'd claim to be "LQQK****AUTHENTIC MOON ROCKS FROM NASA!!!****LQQK!!!"
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grewal12
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
does that mean the girl set them up? when 40 agents with 40 guns came. haha.

just a little confused.
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robot-shmobot
05/06/09

@grewal12: I think the assumption is that Emmermann got so suspicious of the low price of the rocks that he called the FBI.
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/06/09

@robot-shmobot: While he was going to St. Ives, He met 40 agents with 40 guns. Each gun had 13 bullets, and the helicopter had a 50 cal. So answer me this McClaine, how many people were going to St. Ives. You have thirty seconds.
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mfusion
05/06/09

@HeldForRansom_GitEmSteveDave: 1, took all of 2 seconds
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/07/09

@mfusion: Very good McClaine. You will get you next riddle at the corner of 1st and 1st. You have 20 minutes to get there, or I blow up another briefcase!
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/07/09

@mfusion: Actually, the answer was two. The posing FBI agent and Thad.
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AriellaDrury
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
Utter BS, and badly written BS by the thief at that. He is no doubt seeing how hard it is to get hired with a felony conviction, so he's hawking a crap story.

The rocks are in a nitrogen environment, but that is inside glove-boxes that researchers use. The idea that the whole lab is nitrogen is not only laughable, it shows that the subject wasn't even Googled. Scroll down and look at the lab picture on this page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_rock
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/06/09

@AriellaDrury: My question is how do you get "fingerprint oil" inside a Level100 clean room? You wear bunny suits except for gloves? I mean, finger oil wouldn't contaminate porus moon rocks, no sir-ee.
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mfusion
05/06/09

@AriellaDrury: you use wikipedia as a source????!?!? bwahahahhahaaa!
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/07/09

@mfusion: It's a perfectly cromulent source. It embiggens his comment. ;)
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
But EVERYONE knows that we never went to the moon, so this is a moot point. As Joe Rogan told me, all the "Moon Rocks" were gathered by some Verner guy in Antartica before the staged event took place. I mean, Joe Rogan can't be wrong, right? He does sen dep!
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frigg
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
They should have made the punishment fit the crime. Send him up to the moon and have him get some more.

(BTW - long story short, the lunar landing tapes weren't stolen).
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Deaf Mute
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
I read that whole thing, it was very interesting. At first I thought it was completely fake (especially that bit about them having sex on the rocks)
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The Lab
05/06/09

@Deaf Mute: Who wants to have sex on rocks? Without erosion, those things are gonna be pointy.
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Pessimippopotamus
05/06/09

@The Lab: Erotic dermabrasions for both humans and rocks alike.
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Mondoz
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
None of the guards at JSC would ever ask if you got a new car. No one I know ever spends any time talking to them on the way in either; if you did, you'd hold up the line of other people that wanted to get in behind you.
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Pessimippopotamus
05/06/09

@Mondoz: Well. It said afterhours. Maybe the car didn't have the usual parking pass?
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TonyWonder
05/06/09

In reply to How an Intern Stole NASA's Moon Rocks
jesus christ my Masters paper wasn't that long...
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GitEmSteveDave_ My Brute Dojo Code CDIAFIFE
05/06/09

@TonyWonder: That could explain the paper hat you wear at work, and how you can rattle off "would you like a drink with that order" w/o thinking.
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