WASHINGTON — Kathy Lueders, manager of NASA’s International Space Station (ISS) Program Transportation Integration Office at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, will take over as deputy program manager for the agency’s Commercial Crew Program in March, replacing retired astronaut Brent Jett, who quit that post in January.
Lueders will oversee “the facilitation of commercial spacecraft and launch vehicle development and certification efforts,” NASA said on its website. Lueders will officially join the Commercial Crew Program after Space Exploration Technologies Corp. launches its second cargo resupply mission to the ISS, a liftoff now scheduled for March 1.
NASA announced Jett’s departure Feb. 4.
NASA’s Commercial Crew Program in August divided $1.1 billion among three companies for 21 months of development work on crew-carrying space transportation systems. NASA wants at least one of these to start flying astronauts to the ISS in 2017.
