Mr. Goforth has more than 30 years of experience as both Engineer and Manager in a variety of highly technical space and defense-related efforts. He joined NASA in 1990 as part of the Mission Operations Directorate, working on planning systems and automated procedure execution tools for the International Space Station (ISS). He became Deputy Project Manager for the Portable Computer System, the laptop used for command and control of the ISS, in 1996, and ultimately became Chief of the Branch responsible for all laptops onboard ISS and the Space Shuttle. In 2002 he moved to the ISS Avionics and Software Office as Manager of the Flight Software Development Office and later served as Chief Engineer. During 2005 he spent several months at NASA Headquarters working in the Robotics Lunar Exploration Program. In 2006 he joined the Constellation Program as Chief of Avionics and Software Test and Verification and became Chief of the Software and Avionics Integration Office in 2007. In this role he was responsible for leading a large nation-wide Systems Engineering & Integration (SE&I) organization which provided program-level coordination, oversight, integration and management of the system-of-systems avionics and software, including the coordination of integrated modeling and simulation and test activities across the Constellation program and the technical integration of Constellation’s Command, Control, Communications, and Information (C3I) architecture. In 2011, he joined the Avionic Systems Division to support their Strategic Planning and Partnership efforts. In 2015, he moved onto Engineering Directorate Staff to support Strategic Pursuits and Partnerships. In this role, he put together a framework to better focus Engineering’s efforts towards Human Spaceflight technology and systems development consistent with JSC and Agency goals for exploration. This framework guides Engineering’s internal investments and external partnerships supporting Lunar and Mars Exploration.

Mr. Goforth was born in East Texas, raised in Southern California and Arizona, and graduated from Rice University (BSME 1982, MSME 1987). Prior to coming to Johnson Space Center, he was employed by a small defense contractor specializing in anti-submarine warfare