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Urban Sky is a venture-backed aerospace startup designing, building, operating, and selling stratospheric balloon systems. The company conducts weekly missions to the stratosphere, collecting data for applications ranging from wildfire monitoring to urban mapping, and serves government customers including the Department of War, NASA, and others.
The Flight Operations Technician is a field-based operational role responsible for executing Urban Sky's stratospheric balloon missions from preparation through launch, tracking, recovery, and return of flight hardware. This is the final operational handoff of work performed across the company, translating engineering and planning into successful real-world missions often conducted far from headquarters and without immediate support.
This is not a conventional 9-to-5 position. Flight Operations Technicians travel extensively throughout the United States and internationally, deploy with limited notice, work consecutive days, weekends, and irregular schedules, and spend long days driving or operating in the field. Mission days of 12–16 hours are common. Deployments range from several days to several weeks. The role requires up to 100% travel time, including extended stays at remote field and launch sites.
Key responsibilities include: supporting the team wherever needed and taking ownership beyond individual assignments; owning mission execution with strong personal responsibility for success; operating effectively in remote, rural, austere, and unfamiliar environments; exercising independent field judgment to evaluate terrain, weather, roads, waterways, power lines, vehicle limitations, fatigue, and public safety; preparing beyond checklists by anticipating communications limitations, weather, logistics, and contingencies; safely executing balloon and payload preparation, launch, chase, recovery, documentation, and hardware return; solving problems with limited support by developing technical knowledge and operational judgment; operating full-size and heavy-duty pickup trucks extensively during long-distance deployments and off-highway access; representing Urban Sky professionally with customers, military and government partners, law enforcement, landowners, and the public; and maintaining clear communication and accurate documentation of mission activity, anomalies, and observations.
Urban Sky will teach the successful candidate its balloon systems and mission planning. The company seeks someone who arrives with field experience, maturity, judgment, and a mission-success mindset ready to operate effectively from the start.
**Requirements:**
- Mission-first mindset: genuine drive toward mission and customer success with initiative and determination to help move missions forward when plans change or conditions become difficult
- Proven field experience: meaningful experience operating in remote, rural, austere, expeditionary, military, wildland, backcountry, aviation, emergency-response, or similarly independent environments; field acumen should already be part of what you bring, not something you are learning for the first time
- Strong situational awareness and judgment: demonstrated ability to assess ambiguous or changing conditions, identify hazards, make sound decisions, and recognize when plans need to change
- Independent problem-solving: ability to navigate unfamiliar environments, evaluate access routes and terrain, anticipate logistical requirements, develop contingencies, and solve problems without constant direction
- Team orientation: ability to operate independently while contributing actively to a small, highly collaborative team where everyone pitches in beyond narrowly defined responsibilities
- Operational resilience: ability to remain focused and effective under fatigue, uncertainty, and changing conditions
- Based near Denver, CO
- Willingness and eagerness to work with the Department of War
- Valid driver's license with an insurable driving record and comfort operating full-size and heavy-duty pickup trucks for extended periods
- Valid U.S. passport and comfort traveling and operating internationally
- Basic first-aid competency and understanding of operating where emergency response or organizational support may be delayed
- Technical aptitude, basic hand and power-tool proficiency, computer literacy, attention to detail, and clear written and verbal communication
- Ability to safely work outdoors for extended periods in varied terrain and weather and lift and handle mission equipment and compressed-gas cylinders up to approximately 50–80 pounds
