Federal Twitter accounts go dark

Federal Twitter accounts ranging from the National Archives to NASA went dark on
Tuesday morning as the government went into shutdown mode.

Hundreds of thousands of federal workers received furlough notices after Congress failed to agree on a continuing resolution (CR) late Monday night to fund the government.

Those functions deemed non-essential were temporarily halted until Congress and President Obama can come to an agreement — and that included some Twitter accounts. 

The National Archives said the shutdown would prevent it from tweeting. 

Due to the Federal Government shutdown, we will not be able to tweet. Visit http://t.co/11N2X9p8qm.

— US National Archives (@USNatArchives) October 1, 2013

The Library of Congress warned that most of its websites would be inaccessible. 

As of Oct. 1, Library of Congress closed until further notice. Events canceled, most web sites inaccessible http://t.co/pW55mRaAG2

— Library of Congress (@librarycongress) October 1, 2013

NASA’s Near Earth Objects Program, which tracks potential hazardous asteroids and comets, preemptively said it would hault its Twitter account Monday night if the government shut down.  

In the event of government shutdown, we will not be posting or responding from this account. We sincerely hope to resume tweets soon.

— Asteroid Watch (@AsteroidWatch) October 1, 2013

It later clarified that astronomers would still be monitoring the skies. 

To clarify: Many observatories, astronomers are watching the skies. Updated list of Near-Earth objects at http://t.co/mGzjwg6zQm

— Asteroid Watch (@AsteroidWatch) October 1, 2013

NASA’s twitter account said it would be back and running as soon as possible.  

Sorry, but we won’t be tweeting/responding to replies during the government shutdown. Be back as soon as possible. http://t.co/qIx8cigrnb

— NASA (@NASA) October 1, 2013

The National Zoo said it will reserve its Twitter account for emergencies. 

We will not be posting to Facebook or tweeting except in the case of emergencies during the #shutdown.

— National Zoo (@NationalZoo) October 1, 2013

The State Department used its Twitter account Tuesday morning to advertise what operations were still open. 

Our passport agencies remain open & operational. For more visit http://t.co/yUC60snn9y. #travel #government shutdown.

— Travel – State Dept (@TravelGov) October 1, 2013