Structural Engineer

Structural Engineer - Air Vehicles & Precision Strike

Structures Design | Stress Analysis | Flight-Test & Qualification Support

Location

Orange County, California

Employment Type

Full-time

Department

Engineering - Mechanical / Air Vehicle

Reports To

Eligibility

U.S. citizenship required; must be eligible to obtain and maintain a U.S. government security clearance

About Tiberius Aerospace

Tiberius Aerospace is a cutting-edge aerospace and defense company delivering advanced, mission-critical technologies for government and private-sector customers. The company develops high-performance aerospace systems, secure engineering solutions, and complex hardware for demanding operational environments.

Tiberius is scaling quickly and is looking for engineers who operate with ownership, urgency, sound technical judgment, and the discipline required to deliver hardware that performs when it matters.

The Role

Tiberius Aerospace is seeking a hands-on Structural Engineer to design, analyze, build, test, and qualify structural hardware for advanced air vehicle and precision-strike programs.

You will own structural work from early concepts through detailed design, prototype builds, test, qualification, and production transition. The role spans primary and secondary metallic and composite structures, structural interfaces, flight hardware, and mechanisms operating in high-load, high-vibration, and high-dynamic environments.

This is an opportunity to work directly on real hardware-not analysis in isolation-and to use structural results to drive practical design decisions across airframe, propulsion integration, payload, and flight-test systems.

What You’ll Do

Structural Design & Analysis

• Design and analyze primary and secondary structures, structural interfaces, and mechanical assemblies for air vehicles and munition systems.
• Develop structural concepts and detailed designs for metallic, composite, and hybrid hardware.
• Perform structural analysis using classical hand calculations, spreadsheets, scripts, and finite element analysis.
• Evaluate static strength, stiffness, buckling, modal response, shock, vibration, fatigue, and thermal-stress performance.
• Develop and maintain component-, subsystem-, and vehicle-level finite element models.
• Perform load-path assessments, joint and fastener analysis, margin-of-safety calculations, and material trade studies.
• Conduct design trades that balance mass, strength, manufacturability, cost, schedule, and mission performance.
• Support the selection and qualification of structural materials, including aerospace alloys, composites, adhesives, and high-temperature materials where applicable.
• Define structural requirements, acceptance criteria, and analysis methods appropriate to program maturity.

Testing, Validation & Qualification

• Define structural verification approaches and develop test plans for static, vibration, shock, thermal, fatigue, and environmental qualification.
• Support test fixture design, instrumentation selection, test execution, and data acquisition.
• Correlate structural models and predictions against development, ground, and flight-test data.
• Investigate structural anomalies, analyze failures, and drive root-cause and corrective-action efforts.
• Provide structural support during prototype assembly, integration, environmental test, and flight-test campaigns.
• Document analysis assumptions, model configurations, test correlation, and design rationale in clear technical reports and review packages.

Cross-Functional Hardware Ownership

• Work closely with Aerodynamics, Propulsion, Flight Controls, Electrical, Manufacturing, Test, and Program teams.
• Translate structural analysis into direct, actionable design guidance for engineers and technicians.
• Support manufacturing and supplier partners with design-for-manufacturing and design-for-assembly decisions.
• Review drawings, CAD models, manufacturing plans, and hardware deviations for structural impact.
• Participate in design reviews and communicate structural risks, margins, tradeoffs, and recommended paths forward.
• Support the transition of successful prototype hardware into repeatable production configurations.

What You’ll Bring

• B.S. or higher in Aerospace Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Structural Engineering, or a related discipline.
• 3+ years of relevant structural design or analysis experience supporting aerospace, defense, high-performance vehicles, propulsion, or comparable mission-critical hardware.
• Strong foundation in statics, dynamics, mechanics of materials, structural load paths, stress analysis, and material behavior.
• Experience with finite element analysis tools such as ANSYS, Abaqus, NASTRAN, FEMAP, Patran, or equivalent.
• Experience developing and interpreting analysis for static, dynamic, vibration, shock, buckling, fatigue, and thermal loading conditions.
• Familiarity with CAD tools such as NX, Creo, CATIA, SolidWorks, or equivalent.
• Working knowledge of metallic and composite structures, fasteners, joints, bonding, and common aerospace manufacturing methods.
• Experience supporting structural test planning, execution, data reduction, and analysis-to-test correlation.
• Ability to use first-principles engineering and hand calculations to independently check simulation results.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to explain complex structural results to multidisciplinary teams.
• U.S. citizenship and eligibility to obtain and maintain a U.S. government security clearance.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with missile, munition, high-speed air vehicle, UAS, rocket, launch vehicle, or other high-dynamic aerospace hardware.
• Experience with high-g, shock, vibration, thermal, or gun-launch environments.
• Experience with composite structural design, laminate analysis, damage tolerance, delamination, and manufacturing.
• Experience with nonlinear FEA, contact analysis, explicit dynamics, fracture mechanics, or fatigue-life analysis.
• Experience with coupled thermal-structural analysis and high-temperature materials.
• Proficiency with Python, MATLAB, or equivalent tools for analysis automation, data reduction, and model development.
• Experience developing structural qualification programs and supporting flight-test campaigns.
• Familiarity with GD&T, tolerance analysis, configuration management, and production-release processes.
• Active U.S. government security clearance.

What Success Looks Like

You are comfortable moving between analysis and hardware. You can build a credible model, identify when its assumptions do not match reality, and use first-principles judgment to determine what matters.

You understand that structural analysis is not a report-writing exercise-it is a tool for helping the team make better, faster design decisions. You communicate risk early, support the hardware through test, and take ownership of getting a structurally sound design into production.

Growth Opportunity

As Tiberius Aerospace scales through development and into full-rate production, this role offers the opportunity to grow from individual structural analysis ownership into technical leadership across vehicle structures, qualification, and advanced air vehicle development.

Compensation & Benefits

Tiberius Aerospace offers competitive compensation commensurate with experience, equity participation, comprehensive health benefits, and a 401(k). Specific compensation will be discussed during the interview process.

Equal Opportunity Employer

Tiberius Aerospace is an Equal Opportunity Employer. We are committed to maintaining a workplace free from discrimination and harassment. Employment decisions are made without regard to race, ethnicity, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, citizenship, sex, age, marital status, sexual orientation, disability, medical condition, genetic information, military or veteran status, gender identity or expression, or any other status protected by applicable law.

Applicants who require a reasonable accommodation during the application process may contact [email protected].

Tiberius Aerospace participates in E-Verify.