Flight director

This article is about the situation at NASA. There are similar positions in other Mission Control Centers too.

The flight director, often just called Flight, is the head of the flight controllers team in Mission Control. The person monitors the activities of a team of flight controllers and has overall responsibility for success and safety.

General information[]

Flight controllers work at computer consoles and use telemetry to monitor various technical aspects of a space mission. Each controller is an expert in a specific area and constantly communicates with additional experts in the back rooms or in remote facilities. They make recommendations to the flight director involving their areas of responsibility. Any controller may call for an abort if the circumstances require it. Flight controllers are responsible for the success of the mission and for the lives of the astronauts under their watch.

The flight director is the head of the flight controllers team and has overall operational responsibility for missions and payload operations and for all decisions regarding safe flight.

History[]

During the Apollo missions, the flight director at NASA was Gene Kranz.^[1]

After Gene died in 1974 during the failed launch of Apollo 23, Irene Hendricks became NASA's first female flight director.^[2] She was later joined by Margo Madison, who blackmailed administrator Harold Weisner to move her to that position.^[3] However, Hendricks was still acting as flight director until the mid 80s.^[4] ^[5]

By 1992, Bill Strausser was in charge of that position until he left NASA after over 30 years and moved to Helios Aerospace.^[6]
In 1994, Aleida Rosales was leading the flight controller team.^[7]

In 2003, NASA's flight director is Jen Hughes. Aleida still works in Mission Control, but is back on a flight controller position (THRUST).^[8]