Back to Jobs

Job Description

Overview

Rocket Lab is an end-to-end space company focused on building rockets, spacecraft, and critical subsystems. The Spacecraft Structural Engineer I role involves contributing to the analysis, design validation, and future improvements of Space Systems and Space Components.

Responsibilities

  • Define, process, and interpret static and dynamic ground test & flight data.
  • Perform, validate, and document structural analyses of primary and secondary vehicle structures.
  • Perform structural and dynamic simulations, including static, modal, random vibration, buckling, and thermoelastic.
  • Work closely with design and test engineers to iterate through design concepts and determine test requirements.
  • Define test requirements and directly support testing of vehicle subsystems and components.
  • Lead technical projects and programs within analysis and across disciplines and teams.
  • Help implement new theory and tools within the team and establish best practices.

Requirements

  • Bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering or other engineering discipline.
  • Eligible to obtain and maintain a security clearance.
  • U.S. citizenship is required.
  • Structural analysis experience in the aerospace industry.
  • Experience using NX Nastran, NX CAD, and Teamcenter packages.

Benefits

  • 401k
  • Health Insurance
  • Dental
  • Vision
  • PTO

Additional Information

  • Location: Long Beach, CA.
  • This position may require prolonged periods of sitting, standing, walking, and computer work.

Benefits

401k
Health Insurance
Dental
Vision
PTO
Apply for This Position

How this job compares in Long Beach, CA

Pay in context

At roughly $47/hr, this posting lands within a few percent of the $49/hr median for welding jobs in Long Beach, CA, whose middle half runs $34–$58/hr across 37 postings with published pay. Put another way, it pays more than about 46% of the comparable postings we have wage data for. In other words it is a market-rate offer, so benefits, overtime, and shift schedule are where the real difference between this and the next posting on the list shows up.

The local market in Long Beach, CA

We're tracking 42 other active welding openings in Long Beach, CA right now, from 18 different employers. 11 of them were added in the last week. Across California as a whole we're tracking 486 other active welding openings from 234 employers. A metro this active generally means you have real leverage — employers here are competing for the same welders. Browse every welding job in Long Beach, or widen the search to California.

Rocket Lab currently has 2 other openings live in California, which is usually a sign of either steady growth or steady turnover — worth asking which in the interview.

The most active employers in California at the moment, by number of open welding reqs, are SpaceX (35), Welding Shop in Los Angeles, CA (17), and Relativity Space (14). Volume like that usually means either a genuine expansion or a staffing agency working several client sites — worth knowing which before you apply.

Within California, the best-paying metros we track by median hourly rate are Long Beach at $49/hr, El Segundo at $48/hr, and Los Angeles at $44/hr. Long Beach is among them.

Similar openings near Long Beach, CA

Pay figures are medians computed from live postings in the Welding Pros index, not from survey data, and they move as employers post. Spacecraft Structural Engineer I figures were last recalculated when this page was built.