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H. Kevin Rivers, Associate Center Director, Technical, NASA’s Langley Research Center

Portrait of H. Kevin Rivers, Research Directorate at NASA Langley Research Center.
H. Kevin Rivers, Associate Center Director, Technical, at NASA’s Langley Research Center.
NASA

Kevin Rivers is the Associate Center Director, Technical, at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.

In this role, Rivers leads strategy and transformation of the center’s technical capabilities to ensure NASA’s future mission success. He is particularly focused on accelerating Langley’s internal and external collaborations as well as the infusion of digital technologies so the Center can thrive in an ever-more digitally enabled, hyper-connected, fast-paced, and globally competitive world.

Prior to this assignment, Rivers served as Director of the Research Directorate (RD), providing executive leadership to Langley’s largest organization. The Research Directorate is made up of over 620 civil service researchers and support personnel, as well as more than 350 on-site contractor employees.  As director, Rivers provided focused, technical leadership to NASA programs and projects through conceiving, advocating, proposing, planning, and executing mission-relevant, high-impact research and engineering activities.

Rivers previously served as the Deputy Director of RD at Langley and prior to that, as Deputy Director for Flight Projects Directorate.  There, Kevin assisted the center’s Director for Flight Projects in leading and managing the development and execution of advanced flight projects to support all NASA Missions including Aeronautics, Human Exploration and Operations, Science, and Space Technology.  He was also responsible for long-range project planning and formulation of Project Office objectives, policy, and processes.

Rivers also managed the Launch Abort System Office within the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle Program where he was responsible for all aspects of the Launch Abort System development. He successfully led the Launch Abort System team to develop and demonstrate the system through the Pad Abort-1 flight test in May 2010 and through the Exploration Flight Test-1 in December 2014.

During his long career at Langley, Rivers has served as research engineer, project technical lead, branch head, and project manager.  In these prior assignments, he led the development of advanced structures technologies for future spacecraft, an on-orbit repair for the Space Shuttle wing-leading-edge, and the integrated vehicle design and analysis for the historic Ares 1-X flight test that flew in November 2009.

He earned a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering at Mississippi State University and a Master of Science in Aerospace Engineering at Old Dominion University.  

Rivers has authored many technical articles and also holds numerous letters of patent.