Cape Canavarel, Fla. ? America’s space agency was shaken Thursday by two startling and unrelated reports: One involved claims that astronauts were drunk before flying. The other was news from NASA itself that a worker had sabotaged a computer set for delivery to the international space station.

It was just another jolt for an operation that has had a rocky year, beginning with the arrest of an astronaut accused of attacking a rival in a love triangle.

“It’s going to shake up the world, I’ll tell you that,” retired NASA executive Seymour Himmel said of the latest news. “There will be congressional hearings that you will not be able to avoid.”

News of the two latest bombshells broke within just a few hours Thursday afternoon.

Aviation Week & Space Technology reported on its Web site that a panel studying astronaut health found that on two occasions astronauts were allowed to fly after flight surgeons and other astronauts warned they were so drunk they posed a safety risk.

The independent panel also found “heavy use of alcohol” before launch – within the standard 12-hour “bottle-to-throttle” rule, the magazine reported.

A NASA official confirmed the report contains such details, but said they were from anonymous interviews and not substantiated. The official asked that his name not be used because NASA will discuss the health report today.

The Aviation Week story did not say how long ago the alleged incidents took place, nor did it say whether it involved pilots or other crew members.

At a news conference to discuss the upcoming space shuttle launch set for Aug. 7, NASA’s space operations chief was asked repeatedly about the drunken astronaut report.

The manager, Bill Gerstenmaier, would only say that he had never seen an intoxicated astronaut before flight or been involved in any disciplinary action related to that.

But Gerstenmaier had more news. He revealed that an employee for a NASA subcontractor had cut the wires in a computer that was about to be loaded into the shuttle Endeavour for launch.

The sabotage, which was uncovered over the last week, appears to have occurred in early June, while the devices were still at Invocon Inc., an electronics firm in Conroe, Texas, about 30 miles north of Houston. Gerstenmaier said the sabotage did not endanger the shuttle or its crew.

NASA hopes to fix the computer in time for launch next month. It’s intended to be installed inside the space station to collect data from strain gauges on a major outside beam.

The independent panel reviewing astronaut health and NASA’s psychological screening process was created following the arrest in February of former space shuttle flier Lisa Nowak. Nowak is accused of attacking the girlfriend of a fellow astronaut – her romantic rival – with pepper spray in a parking lot at Orlando International Airport. Fired by NASA in March, she has pleaded not guilty to charges of attempted kidnapping, battery and burglary with assault.

The scandal was followed by a freak hailstorm that tore into a space shuttle on the launch pad that set back the year’s flight schedule. Then there was a shooting at Johnson Space Center in Houston by an employee who ultimately killed himself.