Beth Moses

Chief Astronaut Instructor and Interiors Program Manager
Virgin Galactic
BSAAE 1992
MSAAE 1994

 

 

 

 

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"My Purdue AAE education is arguably the most crucial tool in my professional toolbox – thank you, AAE, for your wise and enduring counsel. You not only taught me the fundamentals of aerospace engineering but how to think independently, collaborate politely, be pragmatic, and contribute to a better future for all. Not to mention how to survive all-nighters in the terminal room. Go Boilers!”

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Beth Moses is an aerospace engineer at Virgin Galactic, where she serves as the Chief Astronaut Instructor and Interiors Program Manager. Her teams design and deliver the passenger cabin of SpaceShipTwo and train astronauts for their spaceflight.

Previously, Moses worked at NASA’s Johnson Space Center where she served as the Extravehicular Activity System Manager for the International Space Station from design through on-orbit construction. She led the global program of human-in-the-loop testing which designed, developed, and verified the spacewalk mechanisms used to assemble and maintain the station. As a result of her contributions alongside the global team, ISS received the Robert J. Collier trophy honoring the “greatest achievement in aeronautics and astronautics in America” in 2009 for “successful design, development, and assembly of the worlds’ largest spacecraft, an orbiting laboratory, promising new discoveries for mankind and setting new standards for international co-operation in space.” 

Moses received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering from Purdue. As a student, she was awarded the National Science Foundation’s Microgravity Research Award to conduct materials research in parabolic flight. She is the recipient of Chicago’s Adler Planetarium annual Women in Space Science Award and a Google Science Fair judge.