Senior Structure Analysis Engineer
OutpostPlaya Vista, California, United States · Posted 8 months agoDescription
Senior Structure Analysis Engineer
Location: Playa Vista, California (in-person, five days per week)
The return lane isn’t going to build itself. Come build it with us.
Outpost is an orbital logistics company rewriting the rules of global logistics by building reusable Earth-return vehicles that unlock in-space manufacturing, on-orbit warehousing, and 60-minute global delivery through space.
Our CarryAll vehicle family returns payloads ranging from 200 kilograms to 10 metric tons, lands within 10 meters of its target, and can then be refurbished and launched again. One vehicle, many missions: responsive logistics and precision delivery for national security; commercial cargo moved with real cadence; R&D payloads flown, tested, and refined across repeatable cycles; and critical aid delivered where roads and runways can’t reach.
The demand is already here, validated through defense and civil agreements and supported by a growing pipeline of government and commercial customers.
We have the customers, the team, and a clear technical path ahead of us. We’re building the return lane. Come build it with us
The Role
We’re looking for a Senior Structure Analysis Engineer to own structural and thermal analysis across flight hardware, from early design through flight readiness and production. This role sits at the center of engineering decision-making. You will be responsible for ensuring hardware is analytically sound, flight-worthy, and properly dispositioned - working closely with mechanical design, avionics, test, manufacturing, and systems teams.
Responsibilities
- Own structural analysis of primary and secondary spacecraft structures, including but not limited to:
- Modal analysis
- Random vibration
- Static and quasi-static loading
- Coefficient of Thermal Expansion (CTE) and thermo-elastic loading
- Perform analysis on a wide range of hardware, including:
- Flight structures and mechanisms
- Avionics enclosures
- PCB and electronics assemblies
- Lead or support thermal analysis to evaluate operating margins, gradients, and coupled structural-thermal effects
- Serve as a technical authority for hardware disposition:
- Assess flight and test hardware prior to production
- Support nonconformance (NCR) resolution and root-cause analysis
- Provide clear, defensible recommendations for accept-as-is, repair, or rework decisions
- Partner closely with design and test teams to translate requirements into analysis models and to correlate analysis with test result
- Contribute to analysis methodologies, best practices, and documentation that scale with the program.
Qualifications
- Bachelor's degree in Structural Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, or a related engineering discipline.
- 8+ years of experience, with at least 5 years analyzing complex aerospace components.
- Proven experience performing linear and nonlinear finite element analysis (FEA) of spacecraft, launch vehicle, or aerospace structures using tools such as Nastran, Patran, ANSYS, or equivalent.
- Strong experience applying analysis to real flight hardware - not just academic models.
- Experience supporting hardware through test, flight qualification, and production.
- Experience analyzing metallic and composite primary and secondary structures under static, dynamic, thermal, vibration, and fatigue loading conditions.
- Strong understanding of spacecraft and launch vehicle load paths, structural sizing, margins of safety, and failure modes.
- Experience supporting structural verification through analysis, testing, and correlation, including qualification and acceptance test campaigns.
- Experience with launch environments, including random vibration, sine vibration, shock, acoustic loads, and thermal environments.
Preferred Experience
- Active U.S. Government Security Clearance (not required, but beneficial).
- Experience supporting NASA, DoD, or commercial spaceflight programs.
- Familiarity with reusable spacecraft, orbital transfer vehicles, or in-space logistics platforms.
- Experience working in a fast-paced startup environment with rapid design iterations.
Compensation & Benefit
- Competitive compensation: $195,000- $220,000; (commensurate with experience).
- Additional Compensation: Annual performance-based bonuses that reward your impact.
- Shared upside: Meaningful equity in Outpost so you share directly in the value you help create.
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