Musk’s SpaceX hires retired Nasa legend Kathy Lueders for starship development

Elon Musk’s SpaceX has hired NASA’s former human spaceflight chief Kathy Lueders, after she retired a couple of weeks ago from the space agency, to help the company develop a moon and Mars rocket called Starship, Reuters reported.

Lueders is the second human spaceflight chief to retire from Nasa and joining SpaceX in recent years as the commercial space company is gearing up to build its ship that could be used in landing Nasa astronauts on the moon.

She has been with Nasa for 31 years and retired in April. She was the agency’s source selection official in 2021 who chose SpaceX’s starship rocket for a $3 billion Artemis contract to land the first US astronauts on the moon since 1972.

In a later contract programme, other commercial space companies for moon landers will also be picked.

She is among the pioneers of the effort of resorting to commercial space companies — a cost-effective approach — under which Nasa funds the building of private spacecraft and purchases rides for its scientists as a service, instead of managing the spacecraft as the spacecraft owner.

Lueders is also credited with overseeing the development of SpaceX’s Dragon crew as the head of Nasa’s human spaceflight wing. Dragon Crew is the company’s flagship cargo and astronaut taxi that has become Nasa’s pivotal ride to and from the International Space Station (ISS).

In a reshuffling within Nasa, Lueders was appointed as the agency’s space operation head from overseeing the moon program, a post overseeing ISS activities.

At SpaceX, Lueders will join her former NASA boss Bill Gerstenmaier, who in 2020 retired from the agency as its human spaceflight chief to join SpaceX for a similar Starship role.