The Hubble Space Telescope at 36 Years Old

Dr Nigel Wright – Biography

Dr Wright has contributed to several space projects, seven of which have flown successfully in space, the eighth is due to be launched next year.  He began his career as a spacecraft systems engineer.  He has held senior positions on several projects as the project engineering manager, project manager, programme manager or project director.  He has worked at British Aerospace, Matra Marconi Space, the SME company, SEA and at Thales Alenia Space UK before his retirement in 2022.

His 37 year career included working on a variety of scientific instruments carried onboard several Earth Observation spacecraft.  These spacecraft and their instruments are contributing to our understanding of the Earth’s climate.  In addition to this he has also contributed to a number of scientific space missions notably including the ground-breaking Rosetta mission to explore a comet, where he was the engineering manager for the spacecraft platform.

Since his retirement he has been working with engineering students as a volunteer, project supervisor and mentor at the University of Bristol.

Away from work, he is a keen multihull sailor and has been able to combine this with his passion for engineering on the development of a novel sailing hydrofoil.

40 years ago he was the Design Manager at British Aerospace in Filton for the Solar Array system on the Hubble Space Telescope where he found himself working with NASA, their main US contractor, Lockheed and the Astronaut crew responsible for deploying the telescope in its orbit.