Caltech named Artemis II commander Reid Wiseman an associate vice president and deputy director of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory on Oct. 28, and he starts Nov. 30, NASA announced.
The job is operational. Wiseman, an emeritus astronaut and retired Navy captain, will hold Center Management Authority for JPL mission execution and serve as the lab’s primary interface for national security programs, which puts a person who has run flight-readiness decisions in charge of how JPL’s missions are carried out.
What the JPL Deputy Director Does
Wiseman takes on strategic leadership, stewardship and continuous improvement of lab operations, along with institutional planning, management and compliance in partnership with Caltech. Center Management Authority means he is responsible for making sure JPL operations meet NASA requirements and federal and state regulations.
JPL is approaching its 90th anniversary, and Dave Gallagher, JPL’s director and a Caltech vice president, said Wiseman shares the lab’s drive for discovery and knows what it takes to lead teams through high-stakes missions. Ray Jayawardhana, Caltech’s president, called Wiseman a natural fit for Caltech and JPL.
Wiseman’s Career from the Navy to Artemis II
Wiseman, from Baltimore, holds a bachelor’s degree in computer and systems engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and a master’s degree in systems engineering from Johns Hopkins University. He joined the Navy, flew combat missions and served as a test pilot before joining the NASA astronaut corps in 2009.
He flew as a flight engineer on Expedition 41 aboard the International Space Station in 2014 on a 165-day mission. In 2016 he commanded NASA’s 21st Extreme Environment Mission Operations expedition, living for eight days in an undersea habitat. From December 2020 to November 2022 he served as chief astronaut, overseeing crew flight readiness and safety for all NASA human spaceflight missions.
The Artemis II Record behind the Appointment
Wiseman commanded the 2026 Artemis II crewed lunar flyby with Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen. The crew traveled 695,081 miles, farther from Earth than any humans before them, NASA said.
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said, “Reid has spent his career at the edge of what is possible,” and added that Wiseman will keep giving back to NASA from JPL. Wiseman said the experience of watching the Sun disappear behind the Moon from deep space is the starting point for the work Caltech and JPL pursue, and that he is excited to help expand humanity’s understanding of the solar system and the universe. The appointment takes effect 33 days after the announcement, a calculation from the two dates.
