{"id":301025,"date":"2026-05-20T07:33:39","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T07:33:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/301025\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T07:33:39","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T07:33:39","slug":"spacex-worker-dies-at-starbase-facility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/301025\/","title":{"rendered":"SpaceX worker dies at Starbase facility"},"content":{"rendered":"

Subscribe to The Y\u2019all<\/a> \u2014 a weekly dispatch about the people, places and policies defining Texas, produced by Texas Tribune journalists living in communities across the state.<\/p>\n

Audio recording is automated for accessibility. Humans wrote and edited the story. See our AI policy<\/a>, and give us feedback<\/a>.<\/p>\n

McALLEN \u2014 The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is investigating an incident at SpaceX\u2019s South Texas facilities that resulted in the death of a worker.<\/p>\n

Jose Luis Bautista, a 25-year-old man from Donna, died Friday morning after falling 8 feet from scaffolding, according to Cameron County Justice of the Peace Mary Esther Sorola. Sorola said Bautista was transported from Starbase to Valley Regional Medical Center in Brownsville, where he was pronounced dead at 5:15 a.m. A preliminary autopsy report showed he died from blunt force trauma caused by the fall, Sorola said.<\/p>\n

The city of Starbase confirmed the worker\u2019s death, who is believed to be employed by a contractor, on Tuesday after reports began circling online<\/a> over the weekend of an accident.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe City extends its condolences to the family and loved ones of the individual who passed away,\u201d Cayetana Polanco, Starbase city administrator, said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cSpaceX\u2019s operations and workplace matters are not within the City\u2019s purview,\u201d she added. \u201cWe defer all inquiries regarding this incident to SpaceX, the relevant contracting company, and the appropriate authorities.\u201d<\/p>\n

SpaceX did not respond to questions about the incident, including whether it was related to the delay of a test flight this week.<\/p>\n

SpaceX initially aimed to launch its 12th test flight of its Starship rocket on Tuesday but the launch has been postponed to May 21.<\/p>\n

While OSHA confirmed it was investigating the incident, the workplace safety agency did not release more details.<\/p>\n

Cameron County Sheriff Manuel Trevi\u00f1o said his office responded to the scene but SpaceX personnel took over once it was determined that it was not a criminal incident.<\/p>\n

Safety concerns have dogged SpaceX<\/a> for years.<\/p>\n

Last year, OSHA hit the company with seven safety citations, <\/a>which include allegations that a crane that needed repairs was not properly inspected before being utilized again. The citations, classified as \u201cserious,\u201d led to a penalty of $115,850. SpaceX is currently contesting the violations.<\/p>\n

OSHA had also cited SpaceX<\/a> last year for not immediately reporting a workplace incident that resulted in an \u201cin-patient hospitalization, amputation or the loss of an eye,\u201d but the citation was settled and withdrawn. <\/p>\n

Reporting in the Rio Grande Valley is supported in part by the Methodist Healthcare Ministries of South Texas, Inc.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Subscribe to The Y\u2019all \u2014 a weekly dispatch about the people, places and policies defining Texas, produced by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":301026,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1475,45717,1485,1472,1474,27,29,28],"class_list":["post-301025","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-brownsville","tag-cameron-county","tag-donna","tag-rio-grande-valley","tag-south-texas","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301025","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=301025"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301025\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/301026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=301025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=301025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=301025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}