NASA’s chief heart for robotic planetary exploration is conducting one other spherical of layoffs.
The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California — which manages a lot of NASA’s high-profile robotic missions, such because the Perseverance and Curiosity Mars rovers — introduced Tuesday (Nov. 12) that it’ll lay off about 325 staff, or roughly 5% of its workforce.
“The impacts are occurring throughout technical, enterprise and help areas of the Laboratory,” JPL officers wrote in an update on Tuesday. “These are painful however crucial changes that can allow us to stick to our finances whereas persevering with our vital work for NASA and our nation.”
Associated: Information and details about NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory
JPL, which is federally funded however managed by the California Institute of Know-how in Pasadena, additionally performed a spherical of layoffs in February. These cuts affected about 8% of JPL’s workforce — 530 staff and 40 contractors.
The February layoffs had been spurred, partly, by a discount in funding this fiscal yr for Mars pattern return (MSR), a daring marketing campaign to get materials collected by Perseverance again to Earth within the 2030s.
The whole MSR structure is now below evaluate, as the unique plan was deemed too costly; final yr, an impartial evaluate board pegged its price ticket at $8 billion to $11 billion.
JPL officers didn’t point out MSR when explaining this second spherical of layoffs, as an alternative citing funding shortfalls extra usually.
“With decrease budgets and primarily based on the forecasted work forward, we needed to tighten our belts throughout the board, and you will note that mirrored within the layoff impacts,” JPL Director Laurie Leshin mentioned in a memo to staff that the lab revealed with Tuesday’s layoff announcement.
Leshin mentioned that the outcomes of final week’s presidential election didn’t play a task within the layoffs, which go into impact on Wednesday (Nov. 13). She burdened that “this motion could be occurring whatever the current election final result.”
Leshin additionally expressed hope that there could be no want for additional layoffs for the foreseeable future.
“After this motion, we will probably be at about 5,500 JPL common staff,” she wrote. “I consider it is a secure, supportable staffing degree shifting ahead. Whereas we are able to by no means be 100% sure of the longer term finances, we will probably be nicely positioned for the work forward.”
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