Recovery Operations Engineer (m/f/d)

As a Recovery Operations Engineer in the Reusability Program, you define and mature the CONOPS for post-flight recovery, refurbishment, and return-to-flight of reusable launch vehicle elements. You enable safe, repeatable, and cost-efficient reuse by embedding recovery and refurbishment considerations into vehicle design, ground operations, and long-term fleet operability from the outset.

Responsibilities

Define and evolve recovery Concept of Operations (CONOPS), covering primary recovery scenarios as well as fallback scenarios, from landing through return-to-flight; Evaluate and down-select launch sites, landing zones, and ranges with respect to recovery feasibility, safety, and operations; Specify and assess recovery ground support equipment (GSE), including cranes, transport frames, barges, and port infrastructure; Define refurbishment and recycle processes, including inspection flows, repair scope, turnaround timelines, and reuse limits; Drive maintainability and operability requirements into vehicle and system design; Support integration and payload processing concepts where recovery impacts launch-site operations; Contribute to fleet and lifecycle management strategies, including inspection intervals and retirement criteria; Develop and maintain operational cost models, including recovery, refurbishment, infrastructure, and reuse cost functions, and support cost estimation and trade studies to inform architectural and program-level decisions

Requirements

Engineering education in aerospace, mechanical, civil, naval, industrial, or a closely related field, or equivalent senior industry experience; Technical background in launcher ground operations plus recovery and refurbishment concepts for reusable launch vehicle hardware; Proven knowledge of transport, handling, lifting, storage, inspection, and repair of large aerospace hardware and associated ground support equipment; Proven knowledge of large-scale logistics and ground infrastructure as primary drivers of operability, cost, and turnaround time in a reusable launch vehicle fleet; 5–10+ years in launch vehicle programs, recovery programs, or large-scale aerospace hardware projects; Direct involvement in designing and evaluating end-to-end CONOPS, covering recovery logistics, ground support equipment, refurbishment, maintainability, and return-to-flight; Practical work with large ground support equipment and infrastructure, including recovery assets, lifting systems, transport solutions, hazardous substances supply systems and launch-site or port environments; Hands-on exposure to launch vehicle or aircraft refurbishment and post-operation processing, including inspection strategies, repair scope definition, structural and systems assessments, and reuse or return-to-service considerations; Demonstrated ability to assess how recovery and ground operations concepts drive launcher architecture, interfaces, access requirements, and design margins; Proven involvement in operational trade studies, addressing feasibility, cost drivers, turnaround time, and risk across alternative recovery and refurbishment approaches; Ability to architect recovery and refurbishment CONOPS that are technically executable and scale with fleet growth; Strong judgement balancing launcher design, ground support equipment capability, logistics constraints, safety, cost, and schedule; Deep practical knowledge of ground support equipment-driven constraints and their impact on recovery methods and launcher interfaces; Clear command of maintainability and refurbishment drivers, including access, wear mechanisms, handling damage, and inspection effort; Capability to challenge launcher and ground design decisions based on operational realism rather than theoretical optimization; Structured decision-making under uncertainty, grounded in experience with real hardware, infrastructure, and field operations; Fluent in English

Nice to have

German is a plus

Benefits

Employee Participation Program; 30 days of vacation; Company pension plan; Subsidised lunch; Public transport ticket; Sport Clubs membership; Individual learning allowance; Childcare allowance; Additional perks and benefits