Elizabeth Kline

Elizabeth Kline is the NASA Element Operations manager for the Vehicle Assembly Building in Exploration Ground Systems at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. In this position, Kline is responsible for preparing the iconic facility to support flight hardware processing for Artemis missions. Her duties include meeting both flight hardware and personnel requirements. Kline has been in this position since 2015. 

Experience

Kline arrived at Kennedy in 1993 and worked as a co-op structural engineer for Lockheed Martin. She joined NASA in May 2006 as an orbiter project engineer for the Space Shuttle Program. She was the lead orbiter project engineer for space shuttle Atlantis at the end of the agency’s Space Shuttle Program. Before joining NASA, she was the senior vehicle engineer for space shuttle Endeavour. Prior to that, she was the lead mechanisms engineer for United Space Alliance. Kline was the first and only female mechanism engineer to earn a Level 1 Certification that enabled her to support launch operations on console in the firing room.

Awards

Kline is the recipient of a Space Flight Awareness Award in 2001. She received the prestigious Silver Snoopy Award in 2012 for her work on the successful transition and retirement of Space Shuttle Program facilities and assets to other programs, projects, and commercial companies. This included her work on transitioning the space shuttles to their final museum locations. 

Education

Kline earned a Bachelor of Science in mechanical engineering in 1993 from the University of Central Florida, and a Master’s in engineering management in 2005 from Embry Riddle Aeronautical University.

Personal

Kline was born in Ohio, but considers Titusville, Florida, to be her hometown. She resides in that city with her husband, Frank, and their sons Frank, Joey, Tommy, James, and Sammy. 

Biography last updated September 2021