Following an investment of $430 million on operations in 2021, SpaceX is now Brownsville’s ‘largest private employer’, according to a Houston Chronicle report.
Brownsville Mayor Trey Mendez said on Thursday at the “State of the City” event that SpaceX expects to contribute $885 million in gross economic output for Cameron County.
Elon Musk’s space company now has more than 1,600 employees based at the Boca Chica site, where it is building its Super Heavy rocket and Starship spacecraft.
“Not only have they become our largest private employer, but they recently added a substantial presence within the city for various operations,” Mendez said.
SpaceX recently posted several engineer job openings at their Brownsville location on its website.
According to the mayor, the company has also invested $500,000 to improve the 46,000 square feet site it has leased at the Brownsville Aerospace Industrial Park.
Elon Musk said last month, “We’ll have 39 flightworthy engines built by next month, then another month to integrate, so hopefully in May for orbital flight test.”
However, for an orbital flight test SpaceX must get the Federal Aviation Administration’s approval and a license to launch it. The FAA recently pushed back its environmental review of the site for a third time to April 29.
The Brownville-based rocket production site, called Starbase, first started testing rocket engines and flights in 2019. The company started buying up Cameron County properties as early as 2012 and unveiled Texas as its launch site in 2014.
