Lead Mechanical Engineer, Airframe

About Poseidon Aerospace:

Poseidon Aerospace is reimagining how the world moves goods. We build and operate full-size autonomous cargo aircraft - capable of carrying two tons of payload over a thousand nautical miles. From remote communities to contested logistics operations, our platforms unlock a new cost curve for air freight, making it faster, cheaper, and accessible anywhere it's needed. Headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area with locations in Washington DC, Oregon, and Maine; we're building something consequential.

About the Role

The Lead Mechanical Engineer will own the structural and mechanical design of major aircraft assemblies from concept through flight testing.

This role is responsible for setting technical direction, leading design reviews, managing subsystem interfaces, and supporting other mechanical engineers. It is a hands-on engineering position that requires detailed involvement in CAD, analysis, manufacturing, assembly, and testing.

Responsibilities

Lead the design of primary aircraft structures, mechanisms, and major airframe assemblies

Develop composite and metallic structures, joints, interfaces, and mounting systems

Define structural load paths, design requirements, margins, and validation methods

Perform and review hand calculations and finite element analysis

Evaluate strength, stiffness, buckling, fatigue, vibration, and composite failure modes

Lead preliminary and critical design reviews

Own CAD assemblies, production drawings, bills of materials, tolerances, and design releases

Manage mechanical interfaces between the airframe, propulsion, avionics, flight controls, landing systems, and other subsystems

Design aircraft mechanisms, including control surfaces, doors, landing gear, actuation systems, and deployable systems

Work with manufacturing to develop tooling, assembly processes, inspection methods, and repair procedures

Plan and support component, structural, subsystem, and vehicle-level testing

Investigate failures, determine root causes, and implement corrective actions

Mentor mechanical engineers and review their design and analysis work

Support aircraft assembly, integration, ground testing, and flight testing

Required Qualifications

Degree in Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, or a related field

7 or more years of relevant mechanical, structural, or aerospace engineering experience

Experience designing primary aircraft structures or large composite airframes

Experience with bonded composite structures, sandwich panels, bonded inserts, and hybrid composite-metallic assemblies

Experience with aircraft mechanisms, actuation systems, control surfaces, doors, landing gear, or deployable systems

Knowledge of composite failure criteria, buckling, fatigue, vibration, modal analysis, or damage tolerance

Experience taking safety-critical hardware from concept through manufacturing and testing

Strong proficiency with CAD software such as Fusion, SolidWorks, CATIA, NX, or Creo

Strong proficiency with finite element analysis tools such as ANSYS, Nastran, Abaqus, Fusion Simulation, or similar

Ability to verify analysis using hand calculations and first-principles methods

Strong understanding of structural mechanics, load paths, joint design, material behavior, and mechanical failure modes

Experience applying GD&T and mechanical tolerancing to production drawings

Experience designing for manufacturing, assembly, inspection, maintenance, and repair

Experience leading technical reviews and making design decisions across multiple engineering teams

Comfortable working directly with aircraft hardware, prototypes, test fixtures, and shop tools

Preferred Qualifications

Experience designing structures for marine environments

Experience developing structural test plans, fixtures, instrumentation, and acceptance criteria

Familiarity with FAA certification, military airworthiness, or experimental flight-test programs

Proficiency with MATLAB or Python for engineering analysis

Experience with product lifecycle management and configuration control systems

Candidates who are not yet qualified for a Lead position may apply to our Mechanical Engineer openings.

What you get from us

Competitive salary and meaningful early-stage equity

Relocation support if applicable

Employee Health Benefit Plans

6% Retirement matching

Flexible PTO

Free lunches, snacks, and a stocked fridge at our offices

AI tools and subscriptions