Thermal Protection Systems Engineer

Posted today

hop aeroIrvine (CA)

Aerospace Engineers Guided Missile and Space Vehicle Manufacturing

SENIORITY

Senior

SALARY

$120,000–$180,000

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About the role

Hop Aero is a venture-backed startup building rockets that deliver cargo anywhere on Earth in minutes. Our mission is to enable resilient global logistics to protect and improve our way of life. Our founding team has prior experience founding a satellite startup and taking it to orbit, launching 20+ Falcon 9 missions at SpaceX, and leading engineering teams at some of the world’s most advanced aerospace organizations. The company is well-capitalized through venture funding and government contracts.

About the role: We’re hiring a Thermal Protection Systems Engineer to develop the thermal protection that enables our rocket-powered cargo vehicles to withstand high-speed atmospheric flight and reentry. Your work will directly shape the vehicle’s design, thermal performance, and ability to be reused. This is a hands-on role for someone with roughly five or more years of relevant experience who enjoys connecting analysis to real hardware. You will own TPS development from requirements and material selection through design, manufacturing, integration, and testing. You will work alongside structures, aerodynamics, GNC, propulsion, and manufacturing to turn thermal requirements into flight hardware.

Job Description:

Own thermal-protection development from requirements and concept selection through hardware testing and vehicle integration
Translate aerodynamic heating environments into TPS requirements, thermal margins, and verification plans
Evaluate materials, insulation, coatings, and TPS architectures against thermal performance, mass, manufacturability, inspection, and reuse requirements
Develop thermal models and work with structures and mechanical engineers on attachments, interfaces, and thermal expansion
Plan and execute material, coupon, and component tests; define instrumentation and correlate models with measured results
Work directly with suppliers and manufacturing partners to build repeatable hardware and resolve manufacturing issues
Support vehicle integration, ground and flight testing, and post-test inspection to guide design improvements
Work in person with the team at our shop in Orange, CARequirements 5-10 years of relevant experience in thermal protection, high-temperature aerospace hardware, aerothermal engineering, or a closely related field
Strong understanding of heat transfer and experience applying thermal analysis to hardware design
Experience developing or evaluating thermal-protection materials or systems, including their integration with surrounding hardware
Demonstrated ability to take engineering work through design, manufacturing or procurement, and testing
Experience interpreting experimental data, investigating discrepancies, and validating analytical models
Ability to make practical tradeoffs across thermal performance, mass, structural interfaces, cost, and manufacturability
Willingness to work directly with hardware and collaborate across engineering disciplines
Willingness to travel domestically to support testing, including between our headquarters in Orange, CA, and our out-of-state test site

Must be a U.S. person under ITAR — Hop Aero will not sponsor visas for this role.

Nice to have:

Experience with reentry vehicles, hypersonic flight, reusable spacecraft, or other demanding aerospace thermal environments
Experience with ablative, ceramic, metallic, or composite thermal-protection systems
Experience with arc-jet, plasma, wind-tunnel, or other relevant thermal testing
Familiarity with CFD, aerothermal environment prediction, or coupled thermal-structural analysis
Experience with temperature and heat-flux instrumentation, flight-data correlation, or post-flight inspection
Experience designing for refurbishment, repair, or repeated use

What we offer:

Base salary of $120,000–$180,000, depending on experience and scope, plus stock options
Healthcare, office meals, and snacks
Direct collaboration with founders and engineers with extensive flight experience
Ownership of a defined vehicle capability, with a direct connection between your engineering decisions and hardware performance
Opportunity to grow your career path within a fast-growing company.
Even if you don’t meet every single requirement, we’d still love to hear from you.

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