Top Staff Engineer Jobs in Seattle, WA

Design and integrate electromechanical avionics systems from concept through production and flight-test readiness. Responsibilities include avionics packaging, electrical interconnects, thermal management, aircraft integration, structural and modal analysis, environmental and EMI/EMC compliance, design reviews, system validation, and failure analysis. The role collaborates with electrical engineers on PCB constraints, circuit cards, mechanical interfaces, harnesses, and advanced manufacturing methods.

Owns fluid-system layouts, thermal transport hardware, and mechanical installations for Group 5 UAV aircraft. Designs ram-air circuits, liquid cooling systems, ECS/TMS architecture, brackets, mounts, and supports. Performs fluid, thermal, structural, and tolerance analyses; develops CAD models and drawings; sources components; coordinates suppliers; and builds test setups. Delivers integrated, maintainable hardware in an accelerated aerospace development environment.

Develop and maintain full-stack internal software tools used across Shield AI. Responsibilities include gathering and refining requirements, architecting robust solutions, deploying internal applications, and maintaining existing tooling. The role requires collaboration with multiple teams and may involve projects ranging from aircraft physics analysis to ticket tracking systems.

Provides senior technical leadership for structural analysis and validation of UAV airframes and components. Leads finite element modeling, static, modal, fatigue, vibration, and damage-tolerance analyses; supports structural testing, model correlation, flight-test validation, and design reviews. Drives optimization across performance, weight, cost, and manufacturability, partners with cross-functional aircraft teams, mentors structural analysts, and advances internal analysis standards.

Own aircraft thermal systems engineering for a Group 5 UAV fighter, including thermal analysis, CFD modeling, cooling-system design, requirements, risk management, CAD integration, testing, supplier execution, qualification, and airworthiness support. The role requires hands-on development of thermal hardware, model correlation with test data, and technical leadership across structures, avionics, fluid systems, and other vehicle disciplines.

Lead mass properties analysis for autonomous aircraft across design, prototyping, and production. Estimate and verify weight, center of gravity, and inertia; develop analysis tools; maintain reports and databases; execute verification tests; and support system trade studies. Collaborate with aerodynamics, structures, avionics, propulsion, and manufacturing teams to control mass properties and ensure compliance throughout development.

Own the architecture, analysis, design, integration, testing, and flight validation of aircraft Environmental Control Systems. Perform thermal-fluid trade studies, system sizing, modeling, CAD design, supplier management, test planning, instrumentation, flight-data analysis, troubleshooting, and rapid hardware iteration for a special access aerospace program.

Leads mechanical integration of weapons and payloads onto aircraft, including weapons bays, external pylons, fittings, suspension and release fixtures. Collaborates with aircraft design and analysis teams, supports design reviews, and contributes to ground and flight testing. Serves as the subject-matter expert for physical weapons integration on the X-BAT platform.

Develops and validates aircraft and component loads analyses for flight, ground, transport, handling, and test conditions. Creates loads models, free-body diagrams, load paths, design envelopes, and critical load cases to guide structural sizing and verification. Collaborates with aerodynamics, flight controls, propulsion, systems, manufacturing, structures, and flight-test teams. Supports test planning, instrumentation, model correlation, structural testing, and post-test data analysis for safe, certified airframe designs.

Designs and optimizes aircraft aerodynamics through CFD simulations, performance modeling, wind tunnel testing, and flight test data analysis. Develops aerodynamic models and tools, supports aircraft sizing and conceptual design, validates designs across operational conditions, and collaborates with structural, propulsion, and control systems engineers.

Own the mechanical design, layout, integration, analysis, testing, and release of actuated systems for a Group 5 UAV. Design actuator installations, mechanisms, brackets, linkages, and interfaces; perform sizing, kinematics, hand calculations, and basic FEA; manage CAD, drawings, suppliers, prototypes, qualification testing, and airworthiness documentation.

Own and evolve Babylist's AWS infrastructure and developer platform using Terraform and Kubernetes. Improve CI/CD reliability, support engineers across environments, define monitoring and alerting standards, lead incident response and postmortems, and shape platform architecture to scale for millions of users.

Lead aircraft power system development from concept through production. Design and integrate high-power systems, conduct make-or-buy analyses, verify performance and reliability, debug electrical and manufacturing issues, and lead cross-functional execution. Mentor engineers, conduct design reviews, and provide technical and program leadership for the Ranger power system.

Owns the design and qualification of flight-control actuation systems for a Group 5 UAV fighter aircraft. Responsibilities include requirements ownership, actuator sizing and dynamic analysis, control-law integration, power, thermal and structural integration, supplier execution, qualification testing, hardware delivery, and technical reviews through SRR, PDR, and CDR.

Owns the architecture, requirements, integration, verification, and fielding of weapons mission systems for autonomous aircraft. Leads trade studies across mission computing, avionics, payloads, communications, storage, hardware, and software. Drives laboratory, hardware-in-the-loop, flight testing, safety, airworthiness, and compliance activities. Serves as technical authority, leads multidisciplinary reviews, resolves integration risks, and mentors engineering teams. The role requires extensive aerospace or defense experience, weapons integration expertise, and an active U.S. Secret clearance.

Design and develop complex mechanical and actuated systems for autonomous UAVs, including CAD, structural and kinematic analysis, FEA, tolerance analysis, prototyping, testing, and production release. Collaborate across engineering teams, support aircraft integration and flight testing, ensure reliability and performance goals, mentor junior engineers, and provide technical direction.

Design and integrate aircraft configurations for autonomous UAVs, including airframe sizing, weight estimation, CAD modeling, aerodynamic and structural analysis, system trade studies, prototyping, wind tunnel testing, requirements development, and production transition. The role collaborates across mechanical, electrical, propulsion, avionics, manufacturing, and production teams to deliver manufacturable, mission-effective aircraft designs.

Own the aircraft fuel system throughout requirements, architecture, design, procurement, integration, testing, flight, and operational deployment. Design and analyze tanks, pumps, valves, plumbing, venting, sensing, and related hardware across demanding flight conditions. Lead reviews, supplier engagements, testing, data analysis, failure investigations, and corrective actions while collaborating with propulsion, airframe, manufacturing, supply chain, test, and flight teams.

Provides technical leadership for structural analysis and validation of UAV airframes and components. Leads finite element modeling, static, modal, fatigue, vibration, and damage-tolerance analyses; supports structural testing, flight-test validation, and analysis-to-test correlation. Drives structural optimization, reviews technical deliverables, mentors analysts, and collaborates with multidisciplinary engineering teams to balance aircraft performance, weight, cost, and manufacturability.

Lead architecture, requirements, behavior modeling, safety analysis, CONOPs, integration, and testing for a launch and recovery vehicle supporting autonomous UAS operations. Integrate avionics, hydraulics, power, navigation, mechanical, electrical, and data interfaces while coordinating cross-functional teams, DoD stakeholders, and industry partners. Define transport, deployment, field operations, and sustainment concepts for a mission-ready system.

Lead avionics architecture, requirements, system behavior, safety, interface management, navigation, communications, and hardware/software integration for autonomous UAS platforms. Define MBSE models, conduct trade studies, integrate avionics data buses and sensor systems, support flight testing and validation, and ensure compliance with military and aviation standards. Collaborate with autonomy, software, hardware, manufacturing, flight operations, suppliers, and DoD stakeholders from clean-sheet development through first flight and deployment.

Own the architecture, kinematic design, structural analysis, CAD lifecycle, sourcing, testing, and vehicle integration of UAV landing gear systems. Perform hand calculations and FEA, select components, manage suppliers, define qualification tests, support prototype builds and flight testing, investigate anomalies, and deliver flight-ready hardware in a rapid development environment.

Develop and improve machined-part suppliers by auditing processes, resolving quality and delivery issues, providing manufacturing guidance, monitoring performance, mitigating supply-chain risks, and supporting new product introduction. The role requires supplier development, manufacturing and process engineering expertise, drawing and GD&T interpretation, root-cause investigation, data analysis, and substantial international travel.

Design, build, and deploy multidisciplinary electrical and software test systems for UAV components. Architect test framework software, automate provisioning, develop monitoring/visualization, lead design reviews, and mentor junior engineers to ensure high-reliability aerospace testing.

Lead data infrastructure engineering for multi-regional datastores and stream-processing platforms. Drive technical decisions, mentor engineers, establish event-driven architecture, and design scalable managed data solutions. Improve platform performance, security, reliability, and scalability while participating in on-call support. Define data access and storage guidelines, ensure regulatory compliance, and operate distributed data systems using technologies such as Kubernetes, Kafka or NATS, NewSQL databases, Go, and Python.