Afer Musk’s Cannabis-puffing Incident, NASA Paid Spacex $5 Million to Verify Employees

Last year Elon Musk got famous for consuming cannabis in a live interview with Joe Rogan. NASA paid $5 million to SpaceX to ensure the workplace culture of the contractor for safety for its employees. This verification will help in knowing whether the employees of SpaceX are also involved in the consumption of marijuana or any other drugs.

NASA paid for the training of the employees and followed strict guidelines for illegal use of drugs. It is not yet clear whether SpaceX is following NASA’s rules or not.

The smoking canabis is legal in many states, and Musk’s incident was done in a legal state. But, according to the Federal rules, it is illegal, and it is against government security clearance.

In recent news, Boeing and SpaceX are together developing a space capsule for the Commercial Crew Program of NASA. In this project, SpaceX is creating the Crew Dragon capsule. On the other hand, Boeing is building the Starliner. Laws are implemented in the same way as Boeing. The workspace culture will be reviewed for the safety of employees and NASA’s project.

Boeing is trapped and has to undergo the test. NASA is paying SpaceX for verification then it is mandatory to Boeing also. According to SpaceX, NASA is utilizing the money to cover the review cost. It will include interviews and various tests that were not included in the original contract in 2014. According to Boeing, NASA wants a culture review in this contract. There will be additional costs for interviews and tests of their employees.

Boeing spokesperson said that they did not get extra money to conduct the tests. He continued that their company is dedicated to fulfilling the goals of safety assessment of NASA.

According to NASA, it is fine to get additional money that was not included in the original contract. But, there are no comments for providing the extra funds to Boeing. Jim Bridenstine, the administrator of NASA, said that they want to send their astronauts on safe rockets. They want reliable rockets from their contractors.

For some people, it is difficult to believe that NASA is spending additional millions to teach contractor’s employees not to consume cannabis or other drugs. Other companies do not get an additional amount for such culture verification or other basic requirements.