SpaceX COVID Outbreak: 132 Workers Infected At California Headquarters

As many as 132 employees at SpaceX’s corporate headquarters in Hawthorne, California, have confirmed cases of COVID-19.

This is considered an “active outbreak” and the largest in Los Angeles County’s public list of businesses, the Los Angeles Times reported, citing public data.

SpaceX has an estimated 5,972 staff members at its headquarters, the news outlet said.

This is not the first outbreak of COVID cases for SpaceX staffers, as 120 workers tested positive for the virus as part of a COVID-19 antibody study from May to June 2020, which was published in Nature Communications, according to Business Insider.

In November 2020, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk tested positive for the virus after railing against COVID shutdown orders. He opened a Tesla production plant in Fremont, California, despite local mandates to remain closed.

From May, when the plant was allowed to reopen, through December 2020, more than 400 Tesla plant employees tested positive for COVID-19, the Times reported.

The news of the COVID outbreak at the SpaceX plant comes as the Omicron variant rapidly spreads across the U.S., claiming the first life of an American on Monday in Texas. At least 89 countries have reported confirmed cases of Omicron.

California’s new daily average of COVID cases surged 64% this month, according to The Washington Post.

California has issued a mask mandate that requires citizens to wear face coverings indoors through mid-January, regardless of their vaccination status, to help prevent the spread of the virus. The facemask mandate went into effect last week.