In case your eight-day paintings go back and forth was once swiftly prolonged via 9 months, it’s possible you’ll be expecting to rack up some extra time pay.No longer so for Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, the NASA astronauts who spent 278 further days at the World House Station after their spacecraft malfunctioned. On Tuesday, they splashed down off the Gulf Coast of Florida, finishing a saga that had captivated the rustic since closing summer season.However regardless of their far-flung vacation spot, and the risk and romance of area commute, with regards to pay, Ms. Williams and Mr. Wilmore are handled successfully like some other govt worker who takes a trade go back and forth to the following state over.“Whilst in area, NASA astronauts are on respectable commute orders as federal workers,” Jimi Russell, a spokesman for the company’s House Operations Project Directorate, stated by means of e mail.Ms. Williams and Mr. Wilmore have been necessarily not able to go away their office, a cluster of modules going across the Earth each 90 mins, for greater than 9 months. However astronauts aboard the World House Station obtain no extra time, vacation or weekend pay, Mr. Russell stated.Their transportation, foods and accommodation are lined, and prefer different federal workers on business trips, they obtain a day-to-day “incidentals” allowance, Mr. Russell stated. It is a consistent with diem cost given to workers within the position of reimbursements for commute bills.The incidentals allowance for commute to any location is $5 consistent with day, Mr. Russell stated.Because of this along with their annual wage — about $152,258, in keeping with NASA — Mr. Wilmore and Ms. Williams won round $1,430 for his or her 286 days in area.What incidental bills may Mr. Wilmore and Ms. Williams have incurred whilst in orbit 250 miles above Earth? It’s unclear. Normally, those are “charges and pointers given to porters, luggage carriers, lodge group of workers, and group of workers on ships,” in keeping with the U.S. Normal Services and products Management.Ms. Williams and Mr. Wilmore didn’t precisely see their prolonged keep as a hardship. “That is my satisfied position,” Ms. Williams advised journalists in September. “I really like being up right here in area. It’s simply a laugh, ?”Nonetheless, if a $5 consistent with diem turns out low for a role that reasons sufficient muscle and bone loss so that you can desire a gurney whilst you go back to Earth, spare a concept for Clayton Anderson, the NASA astronaut who spent 152 days aboard the World House Station in 2007.Mr. Anderson stated he won a consistent with diem of best about $1.20, or $172 in general.Being an astronaut was once superb and his dream task, Mr. Anderson stated on social media in 2022, “nevertheless it IS a central authority task with govt pay.”He added: “I’d have accomplished WAY higher with mileage!”
