Kubernetes Engineer

Job Summary

The Aerospace Corporation is a federally funded research and development center that designs and builds space infrastructure for government and commercial customers. We are seeking a skilled Kubernetes Engineer (Technical and Cloud Computing Engineer Staff IV/V) to maintain on‑premise and cloud‑based Kubernetes clusters, provide support to the engineering team, and collaborate with rocket scientists and engineers to support critical national space assets.

The position requires full‑time onsite employment in El Segundo, CA or Chantilly, VA.

• Manage Kubernetes for on‑prem and in AWS production environments with end‑to‑end responsibilities of deployment, upgrade, patching, performance tuning, capacity planning and backups/DR.
• Perform frequent full security patching of all layers of the Kubernetes infrastructure while maintaining very high uptime.
• Take ownership and engineering responsibility of production AWS and Kubernetes services.
• Identify and resolve full Kubernetes stack engineering problems independently.
• Ensure successful real‑time analysis of telemetry data from space launch partners such as SpaceX, United Launch Alliance (ULA), and Blue Origin.
• Provide after‑hours support for Kubernetes infrastructure troubleshooting during launch events.
• Support scientists and engineers running workloads and apps in Kubernetes.
• Provide Linux expertise and troubleshooting.
• Evaluate and test new products and technologies.
• Use code to enhance and automate operations.

• Bachelor’S degree in Computer Science, STEM, or IT, or equivalent experience is required.
• A minimum of 5 years of increasingly responsible and relevant professional experience supporting a high‑availability enterprise environment is required.
• A minimum of 2 years of hands‑on experience managing existing Kubernetes environments, with responsibilities of deployment, upgrade, patching, and backups is required.
• Full ownership and engineering responsibility of production AWS and Kubernetes services.
• Be able to identify and resolve engineering problems independently.
• Experience in Linux systems administration, including configuration, for an enterprise environment.
• Strong understanding of networking fundamentals.
• Experience automating repetitive tasks with scripting or Dev Ops tools.
• Maintain a Secret security clearance and the ability to obtain and maintain a TS/SCI security clearance.
• U.S. citizenship is required to obtain a security clearance.
• (Required for StaffV) A minimum of 7 years of experience in AWS, Linux, and IaC; experience architecting and deploying secure AWS and/or Kubernetes environments from scratch; experience with performance tuning and capacity planning in AWS and/or Kubernetes environments.

• Certified Kubernetes Administrator (CKA), Red Hat Certified System Administrator (RHCSA), or Red Hat Certified Engineer (RHCE) is preferred.
• Experience deploying Kubernetes clusters using Rancher.
• Experience deploying/supporting persistent container storage on Kubernetes (Portworx preferred).
• Experience in Linux performance tuning and security hardening for an enterprise DoD environment.
• Experience with VMWare, Hyper‑V, or Harvester.
• Experience with automated provisioning, configuration management, Infrastructure‑as‑Code, Git Ops (Examples: ArgoCD, Ansible, Terraform, Puppet, Packer, Bash, Golang, Python).
• Experience with Agile and Scrum.
• A current and active TS/SCI security clearance.

We offer a competitive compensation package where you’ll be rewarded based on your performance and recognized for the value you bring to our business.

The grade‑based pay range for this job is $ – $ annually.

• Comprehensive health care and wellness plans.
• Paid holidays, sick time, and vacation.
• Standard and alternate work schedules, including telework options.
• 401(k) Plan—Employees receive a total company‑paid benefit of 8%, 10%, or 12% of eligible compensation based on years of service and matching contributions; employees are immediately eligible and vested in the plan upon hire.
• Flexible spending accounts.
• Variable pay program for exceptional contributions.
• Relocation assistance.
• Professional growth…