Joseph W. Pellicciotti

Mr. Joseph (Joe) Pellicciotti joined NASA in October 2001 after working in the private aerospace industry and is currently the NASA Deputy Chief Engineer where he supports the Chief Engineer in his oversight responsibility for Agency Engineering Technical Authority and programmatic policy. He previously served as the NASA Science Mission Directorate Chief Engineer where he had technical oversight for more than 40 space science missions in development, reporting to the NASA Chief Engineer. Prior to this position, Mr. Pellicciotti was the NASA Engineering and Safety Center (NESC) Chief Engineer at the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) after spending five years as the NASA Technical Fellow for Mechanical Systems in the NESC. In those positions, Mr. Pellicciotti provided design consulting for existing and new technology development while leading or contributing to flight and test anomaly investigations. He has been, and continues to be a board member for many project review panels due to his expertise in mechanical & spacecraft systems.

Before joining the NESC, Mr. Pellicciotti held positions as the Chief Engineer for the GSFC Mechanical Systems Division, and the Lockheed Martin Technical Operations (LMTO) Mechanical Systems Manager for the Hubble Space Telescope Flight Systems & Servicing contract responsible for hardware development activity that included launch, landing, and on-orbit servicing mission load analyses, in addition to hardware (flight and GSE) design, manufacture, and test.

Joe’s experience over 30 years with RCA, GE Astro Space, Martin Marietta, Lockheed Martin and NASA includes design of structure and mechanisms for commercial, military and civil spacecraft. He has received several government and industry awards including the NASA Exceptional Service Medal, Outstanding Leadership Medal, GSFC Applied Engineering and Technology Directorate (AETD) Engineering Excellence Award, along with NASA and industry Individual Recognition and Group Achievement Awards. Throughout his career, Mr. Pellicciotti authored or co-authored several published papers related to space mechanical systems.

Joe has a Bachelors degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Pennsylvania State University and a Masters degree in Business Management from LaSalle University in Philadelphia, PA.