Senior Aerothermal Engineer

Company Overview:  

At Relativity Space, we have two audacious goals: to build the next great commercial launch company with Terran R and to become America's leading force in additive manufacturing innovation. Both contribute to our long-term vision of creating humanity’s industrial base on Mars, paving the way for interplanetary life to expand the possibilities of the human experience. This journey begins right here on Earth – where we design, build, and fly rockets to deliver customer payloads to orbit. Terran R, our medium-to-heavy lift reusable rocket, fulfills the growing demand for launch capacity, thanks to our iterative approach that accelerates design, testing, and development while minimizing costs. While our groundbreaking research and development in 3D printing pushes the boundaries of large-scale additive manufacturing.

Your journey with us is more than just a job – it’s an opportunity to shape the future of aerospace technology, additive manufacturing, and the human experience alongside a community of passionate, creative individuals. Join us on this extraordinary journey, as we work together to transform our vision into reality.

About the Team:  

Relativity’s Integrated Performance teams ensure that our products work across all systems and disciplines, from trajectory design to aerodynamics to reliability analysis and beyond. Our groups size the Terran R rocket, design its missions for customer success, reliability, and reusability, and ensure that every system on the rocket and ground is engineered correctly for the demanding environments of launch and entry. Recently, we completed the preliminary design and analysis of Terran R including Relativity’s first-ever work on launch vehicle reusability, spanning advanced trajectory simulations, wind tunnel testing, and structures analysis, among many other projects.

About the Role: 

• Develop and execute CFD analyses to solve novel challenges in vehicle entry heating and supersonic retropropulsion
• Drive the design of major Terran R system elements – like fins, flaps, heat shields, and primary structure - to meet criteria for temperature and heating
• Guide and mentor responsible hardware engineers to ensure hardware meets aerothermal requirements
• Scope and develop aerothermal databases for ascent and entry, including uncertainty quantification, from multiple sources like CFD, empirical methods, and wind tunnel testing
• Mature Relativity’s tools for developing and communicating aerothermal data, including custom and commercial code, databases, and signal processing tools

To be successful in this role, you should be self-motivated, adaptable, and able to contribute significantly to a fast-paced, integrated vehicle program. You should also be able to resolve ambiguity and drive projects to completion. Ideally, you have significant compressible flow, CFD, and High-Performance Computing (HPC) experience as well as a proven track record completing projects successfully in a highly collaborative environment.

On a weekly basis, you will be performing analysis, developing software tools, and supporting design teams. You will also use your strong organizational skills to properly manage the documentation and communication of your actions, recommendations, and decisions.

About You:  

• A graduate degree in engineering or related field, and 5+ years relevant experience
• Demonstrated proficiency in compressible flow and CFD, preferably on entry vehicles
• Experience architecting and executing CFD workflows for external or internal flows, preferably including engine plume simulation
• Direct experience with thermal analysis and heat transfer simulations
• Experience solving complex problems on integrated vehicles
• Proficiency in Python and industry-standard CFD tools like FUN3D and Star-CCM+, including use of HPC clusters

Nice to Haves, but Not Required:  

• 10+ years relevant experience across 2 or more program lifecycles
• Experience with thermal protection system sizing & analysis using standard tools like FIAT, CHAR, MINIVER, or LAURA
• Exposure to aerothermal wind tunnel and flight testing and instrumentation

We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.