Jonathen Lafontaine

Jonathen LaFontaine is an experienced engineer currently serving as a Staff Structures and Dynamics Engineer at Vast and as an Engineering Consultant at LaFontaine Engineering, LLC. With a strong background in dynamics engineering, Jonathen has held significant roles at Belcan, where responsibilities included leading the analysis and design of the Hold-Down Release Assembly for the Firefly-Northrop Grumman Antares 330 / MLV launch vehicle, and at SpaceX, where Jonathen contributed to the Starship program and led dynamic environments teams for multiple launch systems. Jonathen's expertise extends to vibroacoustic analysis and dynamic environments, demonstrated through the authorship of “Vibroacoustic Analysis for Launch Vehicles: Theory and Application,” and previous roles at Damping Technologies, The Ohio State University, and the Air Force Research Laboratory. Jonathen holds both a Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering and a Bachelor of Science in Aerospace, Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering from The Ohio State University.