NASA Names Strain New
Goddard Space Flight Center Director
(17 July 2008) NASA Administrator
Michael Griffin on Thursday announced that Rob Strain will be the next centre
director of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. Strain is
currently the head of the Space Department at the Johns Hopkins University
Applied Physics Lab in Laurel, Md. He will assume his duties as centre director
on Aug. 4.
Goddard Space Flight Center is located approximately
6 miles northeast of Washington, near the Capital Beltway. The centre is a
major U.S. laboratory for developing and operating unmanned scientific
spacecraft. Goddard manages many of NASA's Earth observation, astronomy and
space physics missions. Goddard includes several other NASA installations, most
significantly the Wallops Flight Facility near Chincoteague, Va., and the
Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York.
"My association with
Rob Strain spans years of shared experiences in both industry and at the
Applied Physics Laboratory," said Griffin. "He is one of the finest managers I
know, and complements those talents with equally impressive 'people skills' and
an unbending sense of personal integrity. I am truly looking forward to his
addition to a superbly talented NASA management team."
Strain previously
served as the associate department head and assistant department head for
operations at the Applied Physics Lab's Space Division. Prior to his work at
the Applied Physics Lab, Strain held various executive positions with Axiom
Corporation, Orbital Sciences Corporation and Fairchild Space and Defense
Company.
(source: NASA)
