More Than 1,300 Space Shuttle Workers Get Layoff Notices

[The Straight Story]

More Than 1,300 Space Shuttle Workers Get Layoff Notices


More than 1,300 space shuttle workers received layoff notices this week from United Space Alliance – a NASA contractor that is cutting 15 percent of its 8,100-person workforce ahead of the shuttle fleet's retirement next year.

Layoff notices were issued to 1,394 USA employees in all, company spokesperson Kari Fluegel told SPACE.com. The layoffs take effect Oct. 1 and were announced earlier this month by USA officials.

"Our workforce has known for several years that the Space Shuttle Program has been scheduled to end, but layoffs are always difficult for everyone involved," said Virginia Barnes, USA president and chief executive, said in a July 6 statement. "We are committed to making this transition as smooth as possible."

Shuttle program ending

The Houston-based United Space Alliance is a partnership between Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin that has operated the space shuttle fleet for NASA since 1995.

9http://www.space.com/news/space-shuttle-workers-layoffs-100727.html

[UndertheOcean]

1. Great ! , that is what we need now , when it rains it pours

[TheKentuckian]

2. outsourced to Russia with love

[metapunditedgy]

3. The shuttle has passed its lifetime, and its planned replacement was a fail.

So now we are stuck.

It's sad, and you can see where blame should be placed looking back.

[TheKentuckian]

4. We didn't get power to make excuses and point fingers while we sell out the commons as intended by

the Republicans all along.

This personnel should be used to work on the next generation that we plot the course for rather than tossing up our hands and lamenting what could have been.

[metapunditedgy]

5. The job losses are at a private contractor. I believe NASA is trying to re-task at least some of

its workers, but I'm not sure how many NASA people (government employees) are set for layoffs. It's very political. The contracting companies have been making a lot of noise because this is big money. They can "threaten" local politicians with layoffs, so the politicians go to bat to protect their revenue stream.

The Constellation program was a fail. I don't think that's debatable.

Furthermore, even if NASA came up with a new science or exploration mission, the contracts should be bid upon, and there's no guarantee that the same private contractor would get the job.

It really sucks for the workers, who don't deserve to be the pawns in this big snafu, but I think this is a case where the Obama admin is trying to do the right thing.