General Engineer-Spacecraft Engineer

Full Job Description

This position is located in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS), Office of Satellite Products and Operations (OSPO), with one vacancy in Suitland, MD; Silver Spring, MD; Greenbelt, MD Lanham, MD; or Wallops Island, VA.

Qualification requirements in the vacancy announcements are based on the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Qualification Standards Handbook, which contains federal qualification standards.

This handbook is available on the Office of Personnel Management's website located at: https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/ BASIC REQUIREMENTS: This position has a positive Education Requirement in addition to at least one year of Specialized Experience in order to be found minimally qualified.

Transcripts must be submitted with your application package. You MUST meet the following requirements: To qualify for the 0801 series: EDUCATION: A.

Degree: Engineering: To be acceptable, the curriculum must: (1) lead to a bachelor's degree in a school of engineering with at least one program accredited by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET); or (2) include differential and integral calculus and courses (more advanced than first-year physics and chemistry) in five of the following seven areas of engineering science or physics: (a) statics, dynamics; (b) strength of materials (stress-strain relationships); (c) fluid mechanics, hydraulics; (d) thermodynamics; (e) electrical fields and circuits; (f) nature and properties of materials (relating particle and aggregate structure to properties); and (g) any other comparable area of fundamental engineering science or physics, such as optics, heat transfer, soil mechanics, or electronics.

OR B.

Combination of education and experience: College-level education, training, and/or technical experience that furnished (1) a thorough knowledge of the physical and mathematical sciences underlying professional engineering, and (2) a good understanding, both theoretical and practical, of the engineering sciences and techniques and their applications to one of the branches of engineering.

The adequacy of such background must be demonstrated by one of the following: Professional registration or licensure -- Current registration as an Engineer Intern (EI), Engineer in Training (EIT), or licensure as a Professional Engineer (PE) by any State, the District of Columbia, Guam, or Puerto Rico.

Absent other means of qualifying under this standard, those applicants who achieved such registration by means other than written test (e.g., State grandfather or eminence provisions) are eligible only for positions that are within or closely related to the specialty field of their registration.

For example, an applicant who attains registration through a State Board's eminence provision as a manufacturing engineer typically would be rated eligible only for manufacturing engineering positions.

Written Test -- Evidence of having successfully passed the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE) examination or any other written test required for professional registration by an engineering licensure board in the various States, the District of Columbia, Guam, and Puerto Rico.

Specified academic courses -- Successful completion of at least 60 semester hours of courses in the physical, mathematical, and engineering sciences and that included the courses specified in the basic requirements under paragraph A.

The courses must be fully acceptable toward meeting the requirements of an engineering program as described in paragraph A.

Related curriculum -- Successful completion of a curriculum leading to a bachelor's degree in an appropriate scientific field, e.g., engineering technology, physics, chemistry, architecture, computer science, mathematics, hydrology, or geology, may be accepted in lieu of a bachelor's degree in engineering, provided the applicant has had at least 1 year of professional engineering experience acquired under professional engineering supervision and guidance.

Ordinarily there should be either an established plan of intensive training to develop professional engineering competence, or several years of prior professional engineering-type experience, e.g., in interdisciplinary positions.

(The above examples of related curricula are not all inclusive.) Note: An applicant who meets the basic requirements as specified in A or B above, except as noted under B.1., may qualify for positions in any branch of engineering unless selective factors indicate otherwise.

AND SPECIALIZED EXPERIENCE: Applicants must possess one year of specialized experience equivalent in difficulty and responsibility to the next lower grade level in the Federal Service.

Specialized experience is experience that has equipped the applicant with the particular competencies/knowledge, skills and abilities to successfully perform the duties of the position.

This experience need not have been in the federal government.

Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations e.g., professional; philanthropic, religious; spiritual; community, student, social).

Volunteer work helps build critical competencies; knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment.

You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience.

To qualify at the ZP-4 or GS-13 level: SPECIALIZED EXPERIENCE: In addition to meeting the Basic Requirements above, applicants must also possess one full year (52 weeks) of specialized experience equivalent to the ZP-3 or GS-12 in the Federal service.

Specialized experience MUST include all of the following: Providing technical oversight over a workload of mission-supporting scientific or engineering work; and Performing engineering or scientific work with phases of a satellite lifecycle.

Major Duties:

As a General Engineer-Spacecraft Engineer, you will perform the following duties: Monitor performance on spacecraft subsystems, and maintain them such that the spacecraft continues to perform nominally and science data customers receive valid science data.

Direct a team of several support contractors, and liaise with spacecraft and subsystem vendors to schedule special spacecraft measurements or calibrations (NASA, University, and Aerospace Equipment Vendor).

Develop subsystem tests, approve emergency and routine procedural documents, and develop training material in order to prepare operations personnel for upcoming special activities or changed capabilities of the instrument or operations software.

Manage and maintain the satellite subsystems, satellite testing, calibration, and the configuration of satellites for a US weather satellite system.

POSITIONS REQUIREMENTS: Position requires 24-hour on-call support due to Spacecraft and instrument anomalies occurrence at any time.

Required to carry a government-provided cell phone and respond to off-hour (nights, weekend, leave) calls in a timely manner.

As an Emergency Response employee, incumbent will be required to travel to site during inclement weather if necessary to respond to an anomaly, and to remain on-site until the issue is resolved or otherwise instructed.

Occasional travel to NOAA's alternate back-up operation facility to restore and continue satellite operations while the operations facility is repaired/restored to operation, or to exercise those functions in support of organizational and national contingency planning.

Incumbent will be required to travel to other government or contractor facilities to participate in training, testing, anomaly investigation, or development activities.

Throughout the recruitment and hiring process we will be communicating with you via email; therefore, it is imperative that the email address you provide when applying for this vacancy remains active.

Should your email address change, please notify the point of contact identified in the vacancy announcement as soon as possible so that we can update our system.