Google is taking over management of NASA's massive, historic Hangar One. On Monday, the agency announced that Planetary Ventures, Google's real estate subdivision, is now in negotiations to lease Hangar One and the surrounding Moffett Federal Airfield. As part of the deal, Google will perform much-needed maintenance on a number of structures around the airfield, including Hangar One, and it will pay to operate the airfield, cutting NASA's costs. The deal "will allow NASA to focus its resources on core missions," says NASA administrator Charles Bolden, "while protecting the federal need to use Moffett Field as a continued, limited-use airfield."

Hangar One, built in the 1930s, has been badly in need of rehabilitation for years. The 8-acre hangar was originally built to house rigid airships, then repurposed as a more general-purpose hangar by the Navy. In 1994 it was turned over to NASA's Ames Research Center, but toxic chemicals were found leeching from the outer skin in 1997, and officials closed it, leaving its future uncertain. A few years ago, crews set to work skinning the facility, and today its skeleton sits vacant in the airfield. As part of its contract, Google has agreed to re-skin Hangar One and rehabilitate it along with Hangars 2 and 3, as well as create an educational and public use facility and maintain Moffett Field itself.

NASA, meanwhile, has been trimming its budget by handing over little-used spaces to private companies. Late last year, it began negotiations with SpaceX for a lease on a Kennedy Space Center launchpad. The deal with Google is also in the negotiation phase, so the exact specifics aren't known, but the hangar's future has finally been guaranteed.

Update: A previous version of the article referred to H211 as "Google-owned." It is instead a company owned by Google executives.