'Safety remains a top priority': Nasa says 20% of workforce to depart space agency; here's why
Around 20% of Nasa's workforce is expected to leave the agency, a spokesperson of the agency confirmed to news agency Reuters on Friday.
Roughly 3,870 employees are projected to depart, although the figure could change in the coming days and weeks
After the departures, Nasa's workforce would stand at 14,000 employees. The shake-up comes as the Trump administration moves to cut staff and faces growing concerns over steep budget reductions for the agency.
"Safety remains a top priority for our agency as we balance the need to become a more streamlined and more efficient organization and work to ensure we remain fully capable of pursuing a Golden Era of exploration and innovation, including to the Moon and Mars," stated Nasa spokesperson Cheryl Warner as quoted by CBS News.
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The White House has proposed cutting Nasa's science budget by nearly 50 per cent.
'We are losing some of the brightest minds of our time,' said Democratic leader George Whitesides, a former Nasa chief of staff and the vice-ranking member of the House committee overseeing the agency. 'It will have terrible implications for decades to come,' he was quoted as saying to Politico.
Nasa employs around 17,000 people, but about 80 per cent of those expected to leave are senior officials. These are top-level leaders responsible for major engineering projects, such as Mars rover missions.
The staff drain would result in depriving the agency of 'highly specialized, irreplaceable knowledge crucial to carrying out Nasa's mission,' said Nasa administrator Sean Duffy.
Other major centres like the Johnson Space Center, Nasa headquarters, Langley Research Center, Kennedy Space Center, and Marshall Space Flight Center are set to lose around 400 employees each, according to Politico.
These centers handle most of Nasa's human spaceflight operations, aviation research, rocket launches, and engineering work. Without them, the agency is incapable of running the International Space Station, send payloads into orbit, or plan missions to the Moon.
The Goddard Space Flight Center under Nasa is set to witness the exiting of nearly 800 of its 3,000 staff. The center is responsible for space probes and major projects, such as infrared space telescopes.
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