justin said:
17% of the ER forum is completely drug free.
Not by choice. Like Alice Cooper my drug of choice was beer, but I'm still curious after all these years.
Back in 1981, with no idea that I was observing history, I watched the USS NIMITZ return to port after an EA-6B had hit the ramp on approach. The pilot had been on decongestants or antihistamines and that presumably messed up his coordination. Unfortunately the ensuing fire also killed 19 members of the deck crew, 11 of whom had marijuana in their tissue at the autopsy. I can't remember an aviation accident as bad as that one in the last 25 years, although none of the survivors could testify how marijuana use affected the firefighting response.
The "drug rules" of that time required actual possession. Any khaki-clad leader showing up on the fantail of any Navy vessel would witness a veritable smoke-filled hailstorm of objects flying astern as the crew looked busy somewhere else.
The CNO, ADM Hayward, issued his famous "Not in my Navy" message. Possession was replaced by "reasonable cause". Soon we young ensigns were being trained how to recognize LSD flashbacks, pupil dilation/constriction, the scent of burning marijuana, and a host of other valuable leadership skills. "Second-hand smoke" was a hot topic for several years. After about 10 years the Navy's urinalysis program finally started getting it right, and it was very hard to stay in if you popped on urinalysis.
However we still had to coexist with the youth-oriented drug culture. When I was screening scarce highly-trained sailors into the nuclear-weapons Personnel Reliability Program, we had to waive pre-service drug use. "Experimentation" was controversial because the best & the brightest didn't try MJ just once-- usually four or five times was considered adequate data acquisition. No matter how long those guys had been in the service, the nuclear inspectors still raised eyebrows at their records.
I "lost" several sailors due to urinalysis failure. That verb's in quotes because it usually turned out that the troops had a pretty good idea what was going on, and they were usually happier to be in port&stbd watch rotation rather than sharing three-section with someone always high or recovering. After another decade (and after sitting several dozen discharge boards), marijuana faded as the drug of choice.
Back then, with the help of Cheech & Chong, we were barely beginning to recognize how marijuana sucked the initiative, drive, alertness, & reflexes out of your average servicemember. Today it's coke, ecstasy, & crystal meth-- and it seems much more likely to just kill them...
(Cute Fuzzy Bunny) said:
... and I was holding a top secret and nuclear Q clearance at the time and doing contract work with the air force.
Ah, so you're the @#$% that we have to thank for all those $#^%-up nuclear weapons handling rules!