NASA Hopes To Rent Out Cape Canaveral Launchpads, Other Facilities

If you’re in the market to purchase a launchpad you might be in luck, the NASA team at Kennedy Space Center are prepared to offer up Cape Canaveral launchpads for rent.

Speaking about the current state of the launchpad’s director said:

“I have a lot of facilities that we, NASA, no longer need. I don’t have the money to maintain them, I don’t have the money to tear them down. They’re just going to sit and rot.”

News of the rental program comes several years after the agency began massive lay-offs that included sending 9,000 employees packing since 2009, just as the spaceport turns 50-years-old.

In announcing the stations rental program the facilities chief architect says:

“We’re putting out the word officially and unofficially that Kennedy Space Center is open for business.”

The business the architect is speaking of includes a fully operational launchpad, two mobile launch platforms, two maintenance hangers and nearly 15,000 feet of runway.

The agency hopes to attract company’s looking to capitalize on the upcoming “space travel” industry which includes the firm SpaceX which NASA is believed to be courting as a rental partner at Cape Canaveral.

While rental agreements are far from complete Lockheed Martin is already renting a “clean room” that was previously used to prep Apollo capsules. Boeing also plans to move into a hangar where it will employ 550 people.

Do you think the U.S. Space Agency is in a sad state of disrepair based on the fact that our most popular NASA destinations are now going up for rent to the highest bidders?