Michael Viens is the Assistant Director for Safety and Mission Assurance Technical at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. In this role he provides oversight, recommendations and leadership in the planning and implementation of safety and mission assurance for GSFC flight programs and projects. He provides leadership in SMA risk-based activities and collaborations by recommending, leveraging, and deploying SMA capabilities to address key technical issues that advance the Agency's and GSFC's missions. He has been serving on the NASA Human Factors Task Force since shortly after it inception and acts an instructor for the NASA HFACS Certification Training.
Mr. Viens held the position of Chief Engineer of the SMA Quality and Reliability Division, serving as chief technical adviser to Division and Directorate managers and the Directorate Chief Engineer on technical matters related to mission support and the development of the Division's assurance disciplines. Activities in this position include support of NASA Engineering and Safety Center Materials Technical Discipline Team, NASA Technical Standards Program, NASA Office of Safety and Mission Assurance Mechanical Systems Assurance Initiative on going technical support of GSFC Projects, Chairperson for Goddard Technical Standards Committee, Lead for Optical Bonding Working Group, responsible for SMA review and approval of GSFC Orbital Debris Assessments/End of Mission plans.
Prior to joining SMA he worked in Materials Engineering Branch as a Materials Engineer where he was responsible for mechanical testing and inorganic analysis laboratories and then as Branch Head. As BH he oversaw the operation of 24 laboratories and Materials and Processes Engineering supporting for all GSFC Flight projects, both internal and external and was responsible for Branch functional operations, operations safety, personnel safety, institutional safety, ISO 9000/AS9100 compliance, infrastructure maintenance/replacement and resource allocation as well as personnel management and training.
Mr. Viens has participated and led numerous mishap investigations at both the Greenbelt and Wallops facilities involving a wide range of topics including Wallop’s aircraft flight controls and balloon payloads, personnel injuries, and flight hardware damage.
