Quick Takeaways
Katie Spicer leads NASA integration of Blue Origin’s Blue Moon lunar lander.
She ensures designs support Artemis missions and astronauts’ practical operational needs.
Starting in lab support, she advanced through space operations to flight controller.
Her work supports returning astronauts to the Moon and inspiring future explorers.
I Am Artemis: Katie Spicer
For Katie Spicer, a career at NASA has been built one opportunity at a time. Today, she is the NASA lander integration lead for Blue Origin’s Blue Moon Mark 2, a commercially provided human landing system for the Artemis program. Her work connects spacecraft design with the needs of the astronauts who will use it.
At NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Spicer evaluates and monitors the lander’s design and development. Blue Origin is developing a streamlined test article for an Artemis III rendezvous and docking mission in low Earth orbit, along with a fully functional lander intended to carry astronauts to the Moon in 2028.
The work requires close coordination between NASA and Blue Origin. The partners must ensure the lander supports Artemis mission objectives—and that its systems work in the conditions crews will face. Meeting a technical requirement is only part of the job. Equipment must also be practical to reach, understand and operate, often in microgravity and within limited space.
“I look at the design of everything Artemis crews will touch, work with, or interface with to ensure systems will function the way crews will need them to,” Spicer said. She considers details such as handholds, push-button displays, hygiene systems, procedures and training. A design can satisfy a specification and still present challenges for its users. Spicer’s crew-centered reviews help bring those concerns into the development process.
From laboratory work to Mission Control
Spicer earned a bachelor’s degree in microbiology from Pennsylvania State University. Afterward, she spent several years as a full-time homemaker, raising her three children. Her NASA career began part time at the historic Life Sciences Laboratory, where she washed dishes, cleaned equipment and ran tests for scientists.
The lab held a remarkable history: Apollo crews stayed there in quarantine after returning from the Moon, and lunar samples were stored there. Spicer moved from maintaining a household to helping maintain a place closely tied to the first era of lunar exploration.
She later worked with science payloads aboard the International Space Station. At the station’s Human Research Facility racks, she helped operate experiments and worked with scientists and crew members to complete in-flight processes and protocols. The experience introduced her to the pace and demands of real-time space operations.
In 2018, Spicer became a flight controller at Johnson’s Mission Control Center. The transition required years of study and training. Without an engineering degree, she taught herself engineering principles, passed certification tests and learned how to work across technical disciplines. She spent five years as an Operations and Support Officer in the space station flight control room, known as the “front room” of spaceflight.
That experience now informs her approach to lander integration. Flight operations depend on systems that work not just on paper, but under pressure and in the hands of a crew. Commercial development can bring new approaches to spacecraft design, while NASA’s mission requirements and operational expertise help test whether those approaches will function safely and reliably. Spicer’s role is to examine that fit in detail.
A human perspective on a lunar return
Spicer says she feels humbled by the responsibility of helping send astronauts back to the lunar surface. When she looks at the Moon, she thinks of the Apollo crews who made the first journeys and the explorers who may follow.
NASA plans to send Artemis astronauts on increasingly challenging missions near the lunar South Pole, exploring more of the Moon than ever before. The program aims to expand scientific discovery, deliver economic benefits and establish a lasting human presence on the lunar surface. It will also build experience for future crewed missions to Mars.
For Spicer, that ambition comes down to practical questions: Can astronauts use the equipment? Can they do so safely? Do the systems support the work the mission requires? Her answers will help shape the experience of crews who take the next steps on the Moon.
Learn more about NASA’s Artemis program at nasa.gov/artemis.
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