2022 Ty Smith Dinner

Paul Geithner, BS, MBA
Recently Retired Deputy Project Manager (Technical)
James Webb Space Telescope
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

Paul Geithner recently retired from NASA as the Deputy Project Manager - Technical for the James Webb Space Telescope project at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. Geithner's career at NASA began in 1991 when he was hired into the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Flight Systems and Servicing project at Goddard. He worked on HST's replacement gyroscopes and was the Instrument Manager for the Corrective Optics Space Telescope Axial Replacement (COSTAR) optical correction instrument and the Near-Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS) scientific instrument.

Geithner's involvement with Webb began in 1997 after the second HST servicing mission when he became the program's Mission Systems Engineer. He later served as the Webb Instrument Systems Manager and in 2002 went to NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. as the mission's Program Executive before returning to Goddard in November of 2006 as the Webb Observatory Manager. He became Deputy Project Manager - Technical in 2011.

Paul’s other work experience includes service as an officer in the United States Air Force, working on the Strategic Defense Initiative, a brief stint in consumer credit, and two years in undersea fiber optic communications. Paul is now an employee of Heliospace Corporation, an aerospace firm headquartered in Berkeley, California, that includes working as an Observatory Manager on NASA’s Atmosphere Observing System (AOS) project at Goddard. 

Geithner has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Virginia Tech (1984) and an M.B.A. from the University of Virginia (1991). He likes building things and enjoys golf, surfing, hiking, and other outdoor activities.