Meet: Dave Black

What are your current job responsibilities (asked in 1996)
On the ground, my responsibilities are to provide support to the visiting scientific teams during the installation of their instrument and equipment on the aircraft, and to schedule support for data flights. I also am responsible for the laboratory that the scientists use during their stay.

In the air, my duties are to operate the telescope and it's related subsystems, troubleshoot when problems occur, and monitor critical telescope systems.

How did you get to this point in your career (what education and previous jobs did you have)?
That's a difficult one! I'll try to make it brief: After High School, I joined the Navy as an Aviation Electrician. I went to several schools, and specialized in helicopters. After the Navy, I attended college while working full time as a Research and Development Technician for several different companies. In 1986 I was offered a job at NASA's National Full scale Aerodynamic Complex because of my background in rotary-wing aircraft and research environments. A couple of years after that, I applied for my present position, and was hired by NSI as one of their first telescope operators (the positions were previously held by NASA employees).

What was your personal motivation for following this path? As a kid, I was always a tinkerer. I always was curious as to what made things work. So it was natural for me to get into a line of work where I could tinker and get paid for it! I was also fascinated by airplanes. I have so far managed to satisfy both curiosities in my working career! Research is also very interesting to me because of the unique nature of the work. Working for NASA has been highly rewarding for me. I enjoy being on the leading edge of science, and being part of exciting and challenging situations that occur frequently here.

What are your goals during the next year? I hope to make some significant improvements to the lab I'm responsible for, through the acquisition of state of the art equipment. I also want to continue with the training plan for newly hired telescope operators that I've been been working on, and to participate in the implementation of the new computer system on the aircraft that will ultimately control the telescope system. Of course, I want to be able to help the educational community in any way possible, through the use of the Internet (or by other means), to show school-age children what a wonderful and rewarding career there can be in science and research.

What other personal tidbits would you like to share (hobbies, family, etc)? I have an eight year old son, who is the joy of my life, and who is also very much interested in the type of work I do. I do my best to field his somewhat difficult questions, and provide answers that both satisfy and lead to more questions on his part. Right now one of our hobbies is rock collecting and polishing. He collects, and I polish! He collects far more than I can keep up with, however! My wife, son, and I enjoy camping as well. We like to set up my portable telescope and peek at planets and star clusters under the nighttime sky.