Cowboy Space
Senior Responsible Engineer, Stage 1
$216K–$236K
Kent, Washington · On-site · Senior · Full-time · Posted Oct 27, 2026
- Experience
- 10+ years; development-program experience through a significant portion of the lifecycle.
- Education
- Bachelor's degree in aerospace or mechanical engineering, or equivalent.
- Visa sponsorship
- Applicants must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.
About the job
Leads the full lifecycle of a reusable launch vehicle’s first stage, from architecture and design through integration, testing, launch, recovery, and refurbishment.
What you'll do
- Own Stage 1 technical scope, requirements, interfaces, schedule, budget, risks, and performance.
- Lead stage assembly, integration, verification, qualification, and test campaigns, and participate in test and launch operations.
- Set reuse and upgrade plans, including recovery, inspection, refurbishment, and acceptance criteria for reflown stages.
What they ask for
- 10+ years designing, building, integrating, or testing launch vehicles, rocket stages, or similarly complex aerospace flight systems.
- Experience on a development program through a significant part of its lifecycle; ability to lead and integrate multidisciplinary technical teams.
- Strong practical systems engineering knowledge and fundamentals in structures and loads, fluid systems, thermodynamics, cryogenics, flight dynamics, and control systems; experience with stage- or vehicle-level testing, data analysis, and flight-hardware fabrication, assembly, and integration.
- Bachelor's degree in aerospace or mechanical engineering, or equivalent.
Nice to have
- Experience as a responsible engineer, chief engineer, or technical lead for a launch vehicle stage or major flight system; reusable launch vehicle recovery and refurbishment experience.
- Cryogenic propellant systems, launch operations, vehicle-level analyses, or CAD and configuration management experience (Siemens NX/Teamcenter or equivalent).
Pay
$216,000 - $236,000 USD annually (base salary)
Tools
Siemens NX, Teamcenter
Model-written summary · the original posting is authoritative