SpaceX VP Hans Koenigsmann to retire, Elon Musk’s fourth rent

SpaceX vice chairman of construct and flight reliability Hans Koenigsmann is retiring, CNBC has discovered, and has begun transitioning his position to William “Invoice” Gerstenmaier, the previous NASA official that joined the corporate a 12 months in the past.

Koenigsmann mentioned he had been considering retirement and believes it’s the proper time handy over the reins to Gerstenmaier, in keeping with memo in late January to SpaceX staff that was seen by CNBC.

SpaceX didn’t reply to CNBC’s request for remark.

Koenigsmann, a German-born aerospace engineer who joined Elon Musk’s firm as its fourth technical worker in 2002, and has led lots of SpaceX’s launches and missions. He has a PhD in aerospace engineering and manufacturing from the College of Bremen, earned earlier than becoming a member of SpaceX.

He is served as considered one of SpaceX’s most revered leaders and a jack-of-all-trades: Overseeing launch readiness, inspecting the standard of rocket engineering and improvement, analyzing dangers, and figuring out and resolving points discovered earlier than and after launches.

SpaceX has relied upon Koenigsmann’s technical experience from the very first rocket it developed, the Falcon 1, for which he designed the avionics. For Falcon 1 launches, he served because the chief launch engineer — a place which has the ultimate say to the launch director of whether or not or not the rocket is sweet to go.

Koenigsmann advised NASA historians that he met Musk practically 20 years in the past at a rocket launch in California’s Mojave desert.

“He got here by my home for the interview, as a result of we had no workplace, nothing. We did the interview in my front room largely, which I believed was actually ingenious as a result of it tells you a lot extra for those who go to any individual’s home. You may have a look at the photographs, the books, every thing,” Koenigsmann mentioned. “SpaceX began proper across the similar time.”

Moreover, Koenigsmann was chargeable for introducing Musk to Gwynne Shotwell, who now serves as SpaceX’s president and chief working officer. Koenigsmann and Shotwell beforehand labored collectively as engineers at small satellite tv for pc builder Microcosm.

Koenigsmann was awarded NASA’s Distinguished Public Service Medal in 2014, an honor reserved because the area company’s highest recognition for non-government people.

His position shall be stuffed by Gerstenmaier, who has been reporting to Koenigsmann since becoming a member of the corporate in February 2020. Gerstenmaier beforehand served because the NASA Affiliate Administrator for Human Exploration and Operations for practically 14 years, the highest place main the company’s human spaceflight packages, which marked the fruits of 4 a long time at NASA.

Gerstenmaier was not too long ago in SpaceX’s mission management middle for its record-breaking Transporter-1 launch. He was sitting within the Struggle Reliability chair (also called “Mission Assurance”) for the mission, an individual conversant in the position advised CNBC.

For now, Koenigsmann will change into a technical advisor, he mentioned within the memo, working part-time to help SpaceX’s work on reliability and anomaly investigations. Placing it merely, Koenigsmann described working for Musk as the respect of a lifetime.

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