We at NTIS wish you a joyful and prosperous New Year 

 and look forward to working with you in 2012.

CUSTOMER ADVOCATE PAT MOTON BIDS 

FAREWELL TO NTIS

The time has finally come for me to say farewell to my customers, 

friends, and associates at NTIS. After a Federal Government career of 41 

years and 11 months (the magic time frame for full retirement under the 

old Civil Service Retirement System), I am finally retiring.

My career began by first working a few years at the Department of the 

Interior in Washington, D.C. The remaining years were split between my 

time with the Food and Drug Administration’s Congressional Liaison Office 

(called Office of Legislative and Governmental Affairs) in Rockville, 

Maryland, and my time with NTIS in Springfield and Alexandria, Virginia.

I came to NTIS on April Fool’s Day in 1988. One of the reasons I chose 

NTIS was that my commute would be cut in half—which is a very 

important consideration in the D.C. Metropolitan Area. I had been 

commuting to FDA 100 miles a day round trip and loved my job. I had a 

break in service of five years when I had my daughter, Crystal, and when I 

started exploring options for my return to the Federal Government, 

discovered that a commute to NTIS would be only half of what it would be 

if I returned to FDA. Unless you’ve visited Washington, D.C., and seen our 

Rush Hour Traffic first hand, you’ll find it hard to believe that it now 

takes me as long to get to work at NTIS (25 miles one way) as it used to 

take me to get to FDA (50 miles from my house).

Initially in 1988, I worked at the Sales Desk, then became Manager of the 

NTIS Bookstore in 1989 (with six months as Acting Manager of the NTIS 

Sales Division during 1992), and became the first NTIS Customer Advocate 

in 1994. The changes I’ve witnessed during my 24 years at NTIS have 

been phenomenal.

I NSIDE T HIS I SSUE

1 Customer Advocate 

Pat Moton Bids 

Farewell to NTIS

2 When Biospheres 

Collide – A History of 

NASA’s Planetary 

Protection Programs

3 Its That Time of Year 

Again – Tax Time

4 Analyzing the Need 

for Special Operations 

Teams Within the Fire 

Service

5 Toward a National 

Animal Telemetry 

Observing Network 

for Our Oceans, 

Coasts, and 

Great Lakes

“The changes I’ve 

witnessed during my 24 

years at NTIS have been 

phenomenal.”

 Please see page 3.

 

National Technical Information Service www.ntis.gov pmoton@ntis.gov 

U.S. Department of Commerce 703-605-6103

5301 Shawnee Road

Alexandria, VA 22312

 

 

 

 CUSTOMER

 ADVOCATE’S 

 Winter - January 2012 CORNER Volume 4, Issue 2

 

s
Page 2 NTIS CUSTOMER ADVOCATE’S CORNER 

“Whenever we send a 

space vehicle to another 

world, we run the risk of 

forever changing that 

extraterrestrial 

environment. . . By the 

same token, we may 

inadvertently carry exotic 

organisms back to Earth on 

our spacecraft . . .”

WHEN BIOSPHERES COLLIDE – A History of 

NASA’s Planetary Protection Programs

Is there life on other planets? That question has been relevant to 

astronomy since the Renaissance when Galileo observed that the 

wandering “planets” might actually be similar to Earth. If life does 

exist on other worlds, planetary protection programs play an 

important role by seeking to assure that our space exploration efforts 

do not unintentionally contaminate other solar system bodies. 

Conversely, these programs also strive to prevent the introduction of 

contaminants from other planets to our planet, Earth.

Whenever we send a space vehicle to another world, we run the risk 

of forever changing that extraterrestrial environment. We are 

surrounded by different microorganisms on Earth; and if some of them 

hitchhike onboard a space mission, they could contaminate and start 

colonies on a different planet. By the same token, we may 

inadvertently carry exotic organisms back to Earth on our spacecraft 

and risk the release of biohazardous materials into our own 

ecosystem.

When Biospheres Collide traces the responses to the above concerns 

by presenting the history of planetary protection on NASA’s missions 

to the Moon, Mars, Venus, Jupiter, Saturn, and many smaller bodies of 

our solar system. It details the fascinating history of our attempts at 

planetary protection—both protecting the Earth and safeguarding 

other worlds. 

This report can be purchased from NTIS in original stock as 

PB2012-100565 or it can be downloaded at no charge at 

http://www.nasa.gov/connect/ebooks/when_biospheres_collide_deta

il.html. 

It’s That Time of Year Again

It’s time to start thinking about filing your taxes, and again this year 

NTIS is selling the official Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Tax Products 

DVD. To find out the particulars of what’s on this new version, just go 

to the NTIS Web site at http://www.ntis.gov/products/irsdvd.aspx. 

You will notice that we expect the first release to issue in early 

January 2012, with the final release issuing in late March. 
NTIS CUSTOMER ADVOCATE’S CORNER Page 3

• In 1984, paper copy order fulfillment exceeded an average of 24 

days. Today, your paper copy orders are processed within 3-5 

business days and then shipped to you. If the report you want 

has been digitized, you can download it in a matter of minutes.

• Input of new documents into the NTIS Database took 60 days in 

1988; today it takes only 3-5 days to enter a new document.

• In 1985, the Abandoned Call Rate (caller hangs up before 

reaching a representative) was over 25%. Today, the average is 

1.8%.

• The continual growth of the NTIS Web site has been amazing:

o Instant downloads of reports;

o Ability to search the NTIS database back to 1964;

o RSS feeds;

o Electronic distribution of the free National Technical 

Reports and the Customer Advocate’s Corner newsletters;

o Online subscription products;

o The list goes on and on.

• And NTIS’ work with other Government agencies has expanded 

over the years:

o Helping them distribute their products to the public;

o Hosting their Web sites;

o Working closely with them to assist in implementing and 

maintaining their e-Training and Knowledge Management 

systems and applications.

• One of the most recent advances made by NTIS is its 

establishment of the Federal Science Repository Service to 

substantially improve perpetual access to Federally-funded 

scientific, technical, and engineering information.

It has been a wonderful opportunity and honor for me to work with 

you—the NTIS customer. I’ve truly enjoyed watching customer 

suggestions become realities and witnessing the technical skill and 

expertise of our staff as those realities became the norm at NTIS.

I’ll miss our interactions in the future; but I must admit I am looking 

forward to this next chapter in my life with joyful anticipation. 

CUSTOMER ADVOCATE PAT MOTON BIDS FAREWELL TO NTIS

 From Page 1

 

 

 

“It has been a 

wonderful opportunity 

and honor for me to 

work with you—the 

NTIS Customer.”
Page 4 NTIS CUSTOMER ADVOCATE’S CORNER 

Since not all rescue efforts entail putting out 

fires, the fire service created special operations 

teams comprised of highly trained members with 

advanced skills in:

o Urban search and rescue;

o Hazardous materials response;

o Swiftwater rescue;

o Dive rescue;

o Explosive ordnance disposal;

o Wildland firefighting;

o Aircraft rescue firefighting.

Catastrophic events have changed the world. 

The fire service has adjusted to those changes 

by maintaining rescue as their number one 

priority. To successfully rescue people from 

calamities such as those listed above, more 

than basic firefighting skills are required.

This Naval Postgraduate School Master’s thesis 

presents the framework used by Dallas FireRescue special operations teams that is flexible 

enough for use by other fire departments.

The report may be purchased from NTIS as 

ADA547831. 

Written and Edited by:

Pat Moton

Customer Advocate

National Technical

 Information Service

5301 Shawnee Road

Alexandria, VA 22312

Phone:

703-605-6103

Fax:

703-605-6900

E-mail:

customeradvocate@ntis.gov

 

One of the goals of the Integrated Ocean 

Observing System (IOOS) is to increase the 

amount of biological data in that system. 

Animal telemetry observation is a valuable 

addition to the existing U.S. ocean observing 

capabilities. Species tagged range from 20-gram 

salmon smolts to 150-ton whales, including over 

4,500 electronic tags in the Tagging of Pacific 

Pelagics (TOPP) program that tags sharks (mako, 

blue, thresher, salmon, and white sharks), 

elephant seals, California sea lions, bluefin and 

yellowfin tuna, whales, loggerhead and 

leatherback sea turtles, squid, black-footed and 

Laysan albatross, sooty shearwaters, and 

humpback and blue whales.

One of eight recommendations from the 

workshop is to expand animal telemetry 

education and outreach programs to foster 

public understanding of the value of the ocean, 

coasts, and ocean observing systems.

This 56-page National Oceanic and Atmospheric 

Administration (NOAA) Technical Memorandum 

can be downloaded at no charge from the NOAA

Web site at 

http://swfsc.noaa.gov/publications/TM/SWFSC/

NOAA-TM-NMFS-SWFSC-482.pdf. It also is 

available from NTIS as PB2012-100206. 

* * *

If you have not already subscribed to receive 

future copies of this free quarterly newsletter, 

please send an e-mail to:

customeradvocate@ntis.gov

Please include “Subscribe to NTIS Customer 

Advocate’s Corner” in the subject line of your e-mail.

To access previous issues, go to 

http://www.ntis.gov/help/overview.aspx#CACN

Previous issues are listed under the red highlighting.

Analyzing the Need for 

Special Operations 

Teams Within the Fire 

Service

The primary mission of the 

fire service is suppressing

fires and rescuing victims.

Toward a National Animal Telemetry 

Observing Network (ATN) for our Oceans, 

Coasts, and Great Lakes: Workshop 

Synthesis Report