US Presidential Election President Trump greets Elon Musk when he arrives to attend to view the launch of the SpaceX Starship rocket’s 6th Test Flight, held in Brownsville, Texas on November 19, 2024.
Brandon Bell | Getty Images News | Getty Images
NASA is requiring employees involved in Artemis Missions to continue their work during government shutdowns, CNBC learned.
Their work will be unpaid during the closure, but employees should record their time, NASA chief executive Kelly Elliott wrote in an email to staff on Wednesday. NASA employees are expected to receive work payments once they reopen.
In a separate memo from Monday, NASA’s acting financial officer Steve Singh explained the details of the missions supported during the shutdown.
NASA will continue to support the International Space Station’s “planned operation” and satellite missions “in operational stage,” Singh writes. He added that NASA will support “Artemis operations during funding lapse” including employees and contractors working on these projects.
Singh said NASA has hit around 15,000 people and requires around 3,000 staff to continue working part-time or full-time jobs during the shutdown.
The US government closure began early Wednesday morning, setting the stage for the stages of hundreds of thousands of federal workers and closures of many major programs and services. Government officials deemed “essential” such as Transportation Security Agency (TSA) officers and air traffic controllers are necessary to continue.
On its website, NASA describes Artemis as a campaign to “sponsors to discover astronauts to explore the moon for scientific discovery, economic benefits, and build the foundation for the mission of the first crew to Mars.” This week’s notes did not name contractors associated with various Artemis missions.
SpaceX, commanded by Elon Musk, has won a major Artemis contract with Starship Rocket, the tallest and most powerful rocket ever launched. SpaceX will fly the full spacecraft rocket system in 10 test flights starting in April 2023, with another test flight planned for October 13th. Previous spacecraft test flights included five obstacles, partial obstacles and four successes.
Blue Origin, owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, has been given a separate Artemis contract and will continue to work on Lander that month during the closure, a NASA employee told CNBC.
The Artemis III, scheduled for 2027, will be the first to directly engage SpaceX. The mission will land two NASA astronauts in the Antarctic region of the moon.
NASA cooperated with the early Artemis Mission Lockheed Martin and Boeing To design, build, analyze and purchase rockets entirely owned by agents. In the Artemis II, scheduled for early 2026, NASA aims to send four astronauts around the moon without landing before returning to Earth.
And the goal of the Artemis IV+ HLS with SpaceX is to put astronauts into the first lunar space station, helping NASA and its partners prepare for the ultimate human mission to Mars. Artemis V is expected to contain blue origins.
Neither SpaceX nor Blue Origin have confirmed the design of the lunar lander, and so far they have only built test hardware.
Representatives from NASA, SpaceX and Blue Origin did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The automatic streets from NASA said the agency was “closed due to government funds expired.”
“I am in the position of Farrow, so I cannot respond to your message at this time,” said a message from Sheryl Warner, news chief at NASA’s telecom office.
See: Things to know about how government closures affect economic data
