Posted on 03/11/2005 7:05:14 AM PST by The_Victor
About one of every seven NASA workers nationwide will be transferred or paid to leave in the next 1 1/2 years as the space agency focuses on President Bush's moon-Mars exploration plan, officials said Thursday.
However, many of those who depart likely will be replaced by new workers with skills more closely aligned with the new, deep space mission.
NASA employs about 18,900 government workers.
The job outlook presented Thursday by Jim Jennings, NASA's Washington-based associate administrator for institutions and management, marked the most detailed explanation yet of how the exploration strategy outlined by Bush early last year will affect the agency's work force.
The Johnson Space Center's 3,076 civil service workers will be included in an agency buyout offer next month, officials said, but it was too early to say how the Houston center's employment numbers will change.
"The Johnson Space Center is working in accordance with NASA's headquarters on the agency's overall plans, but the specifics of what might be done here are still under evaluation," spokesman James Hartsfield said.
Congress has yet to fully evaluate Bush's exploration initiative. Some lawmakers have expressed opposition because it would mean employee cutbacks at NASA facilities in Virginia, Ohio and California.
By late next year, NASA expects 2,680 government workers to leave through buyouts or seek re-assignment at facilities that have been most involved in human and robotic exploration.
NASA plans to rely primarily on retirements as well as buyouts and transfers to achieve the new mix of workers. Jennings estimated that fewer than 25 percent of the 2,680 be fired.
"If you look at the agency over the past 10 to 15 years, we are carrying a lot of infrastructure," Jennings said. "As we re-focus and that infrastructure is not needed, you have to streamline the organization and size to the mission you carry out."
A buyout offered this year at five NASA facilities, not including Johnson, was accepted by 325 workers.
Several factors could change the jobs equation.
NASA plans to bring the space shuttle program to a close in 2010. Missions were suspended by the loss of the shuttle Columbia. Launches are scheduled to resume in mid-May.
Facilities in Virginia, Ohio and California that have historically carried out aeronautics research will shift focus to attract new work that could retain some personnel.
Employment levels will also be influenced by how rapidly the agency ramps up the exploration effort.
NASA plans to award contracts during late summer to a pair of development teams for Project Constellation, the effort to develop a successor spacecraft to the shuttle that could take astronauts to the moon.
The space agency also intends to boost its expertise in space nuclear propulsion and power generation. Called Project Prometheus, the nuclear effort is considered a fundamental part of the deep space exploration strategy.
Talk about outsourcing!
We're outsourcing to Martians?..........
Too bad they killed NERVA, VASIMR, and the X-15 with its logical follow-on.
25% firing. That hurts! WOW.
TEXAS SHOULD BE EMBARRASSED
Sheila Jackson Lee, the incredibly dense congresswoman from Houston, Texas, has done it again. What in the hell do they have in the water down there that would cause people to vote for this ridiculous human being anyway?
You do remember what this absurd woman did several years ago, don't you? NASA, which happens to be headquartered in Houston, was having a press conference to discuss an unmanned vehicle that was on its way to the planet Mars. Ms. Sheila Jackson Lee astounded every third-grader in her district by asking if that Mars explorer would be able to get a picture of that American flag that the astronauts left up there. Your government schools at work, I guess.
Well .. here's the latest from the Shame of Texas. Sheila Jackson Lee is upset with all of the white names they're giving Hurricanes. No ... I'm not kidding. I could work for weeks and not come up with anything so ridiculously stupid. She really is upset about all of those white names, and she wants some black names stuck in there. Let's see ... we could have Hurricane Lakeisha. Then there's Hurricane Beotis. Hurricane Beotis would come by its name in an odd way. A reporter could ask a black weatherman "What is the name of that Hurricane?" The weatherman could respond "its name be Otis."
Uh oh. Am I being insensitive here? Well ... good! I'm trying to be. A stupid idea such as this should only be met by derision.
Hey, as long as we're giving black names to hurricanes, why not use some the names of some famous blacks? Hurricane Snoop Dog has a ring to it. A small tropical storm that doesn't amount to much could be named Hurricane Puff Diddy. If some hurricane is developing a path that could take around the South of Florida and bring it in the back door, we could name that one Hurricane Kobe.
The sad truth here is that the people who live in Sheila Jackson Lees district might as well be unrepresented in Washington. How is any serious policy maker going to listen to anything this woman proposes without saying to themselves, "Yeah, this is the same woman who thinks that astronauts visited Mars and who wants black names on hurricanes. Let's really pay attention to what she has to say."
By the way, did you hear about Hurricane J-Lo? The real damage was done by the trailing edge.
GSLV Mark III could carry astronauts in two years: ISRO
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1360726/posts
Outsourcing at its best®.
All this without proper funding as well.
For now, IMHO, we should be focusing on science such as Hubble, interplanetaries, solar missions, more unmanned landers, etc. We have already outsourced most of our rocket engines; what next?
www.marsstream.org
> we should be focusing on science such as Hubble,
It would be cheaper to launch a new Hubble.
> interplanetaries, solar missions, more unmanned landers, etc.
The purpose - the ONLY real purpose - of these interplanetary probes is to determine not whether to send humans, but how. If we don;t even know if we want to go, then there's literally no good reason for spending taxpayer money to figure out what makes up the sands of Mars. The robots serve the interests of Man, not the other way around.
I see this as a good thing, It is time this country moves away from the Govt doing this to private organizations and groups of companies doing this. what we have at NASA, in general, are mostly people that have lived off the fat of the land, read that the US budget, and produced way less than any private organization would accept as meeting goals. There are something that NASA is still good at, Mars, the outer planets,, the really long term deep space stuff. And of course the placing of governmental hardware in space.
In truth, it is about time they get back on track and do something. The trouble is that each area of research is it own little kingdom adn each project is considered by each scientest on the projects to be the most important. there is no coherent objective for the organization.
One last note, I want to say that I am impressed witht he work being done currently on Mars, but to all those that think man in space is not important, think of this; every bit of work done by all probes sent to the surface of Mars in the entire life of NASA could have been done by 4 trained humans in less that 3 days. My point is, we risk little sending probes, we gain little too, relitively speaking. We risk more, money and lives, by sending man, but we gain a whole lot more.
"25% firing. That hurts! WOW."
(.25*2680)/18900= 3.5% firing
That was hilarious! Hurricane LaFawnduh has a nice ring to it.
"For now, IMHO, we should be focusing on science such as Hubble, interplanetaries, solar missions, more unmanned landers, etc. We have already outsourced most of our rocket engines; what next?"
We are already sending up new space satellites. Letting Hubble die is the the proper thing to do.
"Employment levels will also be influenced by how rapidly the agency ramps up the exploration effort."
How high is "up"?
Getting rid of about 2000 people will free up on the order of 100 million dollars, though.
I just hope they cut the fat in management, and not scientists and engineers!
"I just hope they cut the fat in management, and not scientists and engineers!"
Yep, and how likely is it that these management types care more about keeping their jobs than they do about the mission.
LOL! I need to read the article more carefully. Thanks.
Big loss to science. The next generation of instruments for Hubble (alread built) would be fantastic.
We are already sending up new space satellites.
What satellite replaces Hubble?
Will be interesting for sure.
Yo! I've got one for the next black hurricane- "FLAVOR FLAV!"
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