List of aerospace engineers

A

• Clément Ader – French engineer and inventor
• Galaktion Alpaidze – Soviet lieutenant general, Hero of the Soviet Union, commander of the Plesetsk Cosmodrome
• Oleg Antonov – Soviet aeroplane designer, founder of Antonov company
• Neil Armstrong – first man on the Moon
• Lee Atwood – design engineer for the P-51 Mustang, and former CEO of North American Aviation and North American Rockwell
• Ron Ayers – designer of ThrustSSC, first land-based vehicle to break the sound barrier

  B

• V. P. Barmin – designer of the rocket launch complex
• Frank Barnwell – chief engineer, Bristol Aeroplane Company
• Thomas W. Benoist – early airline entrepreneur
• Jenny Body – former President of the Royal Aeronautical Society
• William Boeing – founder of Boeing
• Charles Bolden – NASA Administrator
• Ludwig Bölkow – aerodynamicist for the Me 262
• Frank Borman – first man to circle the Moon
• Yvonne Brill – electrothermal hydrazine thruster
• Adolf Busemann – swept wing

  C

• Sir Sydney Camm
• Giovanni Caproni
• Sir George Cayley – notable for his research in aerodynamics
• Clyde Cessna – early aircraft designer
• Roy Chadwick
• Roger Chaffee – Apollo 1 fire victim on January 27, 1967
• Kalpana Chawla – died in the Columbia disaster
• Vladimir Chelomei
• Henri Coandă – inventor of the jet engine
• Nicholas Comper – designer of the Comper Swift
• Philip M. Condit – former CEO of Boeing
• Scott Crossfield – first man to fly faster than twice the speed of sound in NAA's X-15
• Glenn Curtiss – founder of the US aircraft industry

  D

• Leonardo da Vinci
• Werner Dahm
• Marcel Dassault
• Serge Dassault
• Geoffrey de Havilland
• Juan de la Cierva – inventor of the autogyro
• Satish Dhawan
• Paul Bernard Dilworth
• Heini Dittmar – record-breaking pilot
• Jurgis Dobkevičius – Lithuanian aviation constructor, military pilot
• Claudius Dornier
• Donald W. Douglas – founder of the Douglas Aircraft Company
• Iain Dowie
• Sir George Dowty
• Alberto Santos Dumont – inventor of the dirigible; aeronautics pioneer
• Pedro Duque

  E

• Joe Engle
• Walter Extra

  F

• Maxime Faget – designer of the Project Mercury spacecraft
• Charles Richard Fairey – founder of the Fairey Aviation Company
• Roy Fedden – British engine designer for Bristol Engine Company
• Gerhard Fieseler – German aircraft designer
• Anton Flettner
• Anthony Fokker
• Henry Folland

  G

• Giuseppe Gabrielli – Italian aircraft designer
• John Glenn – first man to orbit the Earth in 1962
• Valentin Glushko
• Robert Goddard – scientist who developed the first liquid-fueled rocket 3-16-26
• Tadeusz Góra
• Jay Greene
• Gus Grissom – Apollo 1 fire victim on January 27, 1967
• Bartolomeu de Gusmão – Portuguese priest; aircraft designer
• Antanas Gustaitis – Lithuanian aircraft designer, Brigadier General, Commander-in-Chief of Lithuanian Air Force

  H

• Wolfgang Haack
• B. J. Habibie
• Raoul Hafner
• Harry Hawker – test pilot, formed Hawker Aircraft Company
• Edward H. Heinemann – Chief Engineer for Douglas Aircraft, designed 20 military aircraft
• Ernst Heinkel – German aircraft designer, developed first jet rocket aircraft
• Homer Hickam
• Peter K. Homer
• Stanley Hooker – British engine engineer for Rolls Royce Aerospace
• Jiro Horikoshi – chief engineer for the Mitsubishi A6M
• Howard Hughes – aerospace engineer, owned RKO movie studio, entrepreneur in real estate
• Rick Husband – died in the Columbia disaster
• François Hussenot – inventor of one of the early forms of the flight recorder

  J

• Clarence "Kelly" Johnson – formed Lockheed Skunk Works and design engineer of aircraft: SR-71, U-2, F-117A, F-104, C-130, T-33, P-38, and Constellations
• Katherine Johnson – mathematician who worked as an aerospace technologist at NASA
• Robert Thomas Jones – aeronautical engineer at NASA
• Hugo Junkers – pioneered the design of all-metal airplanes

  K

• A. P. J. Abdul Kalam – former President of India; "Missile Man of India"
• Alexander Kartveli – Chief Engineer at Republic Aviation, and contributor to first aerospace vehicle prototypes
• Alexander Kemurdzhian - Soviet Armenian mechanical engineer who is best known for designing Lunokhod 1, the first ever lunar rover.
• Dutch Kindelberger – Chief Engineer at Douglas Aircraft and head of North American Aviation
• Klapmeier brothers – founders of Cirrus
• Ave K. Kludze, Jr.
• Sergey Korolev
• Chris Kraft
• Eugene Kranz – aeronautical engineer
• Dietrich Küchemann

  L

• Diane Lemaire – first woman to graduate from the University of Melbourne with a degree in engineering
• Samuel Pierpont Langley – aircraft
• Otto Lilienthal
• Charles Lindbergh – made first solo transatlantic airplane flight from NY to Paris in 1927 on Spirit of St. Louis
• Per Lindstrand – balloons and other aircraft
• Alexander Lippisch
• Glynn Lunney
• Arkhip Lyulka

  M

• Paul MacCready
• Elsie MacGill
• Ernst Mach
• Frederick Marriott
• Mark D. Maughmer
• Alan Mulally – Boeing executive and President of the Ford Motor Company
• William C. McCool – died in the Columbia disaster
• Sean McMahon – aeronautical engineer
• Wilhelm Messerschmitt – designed Bf 109 and jet powered Me 262
• Arseny Mironov – Russian scientist, aerospace engineer and aircraft pilot
• R. J. Mitchell – Englishman who designed the Spitfire aircraft
• Montgolfier brothers
• John J. Montgomery
• Albert Mooney
• Elon Musk – founder of SpaceX and co-founder of Tesla

  N

• Gerhard Neumann – engineer for General Electric; contributed to the design of the J79
• Jack Northrop – founded Northrop Corporation in 1939 and later the Flying Wing
• Aleksandr Nadiradze – Soviet Georgian ballistic missile and rocket engineer

  O

• Hermann Oberth
• Wendy Okolo

  P

• Paul C. Paris – known for introducing fracture mechanics to the aviation industry
• Richard Pearse – early New Zealand aircraft builder
• W. E. W. Petter
• Percy Pilcher
• Curtis Pitts
• Paul Poberezny – founder of the Experimental Aircraft Association
• Boris Popov – invented one of the first successful aircraft ballistic parachute systems
• Henry Potez
• Herman Potočnik
• Ludwig Prandtl

  R

• Wilfrid Thomas Reid
• Judith Resnik
• Osborne Reynolds
• Ben Rich – director of Lockheed's Skunk Works; contributed to SR-71 and F-117 development
• John M. Riebe
• Robert brothers – balloonists
• Frank D. Robinson
• Sir Alliott Verdon Roe
• Jan Roskam
• Ludwig Roth
• Edward J. Ruppelt – director of Project Blue Book
• Burt Rutan – airplane and spacecraft designer
• Tubal Claude Ryan – founder of the Ryan Aeronautical Company

  S

• Edgar Schmued – lead engineer on the P-51, F-86, F-100, F-5, T-38
• Joe Shea – NASA Administrator for the Apollo Program
• Nevil Shute – aeronautical engineer and author
• Igor Sikorsky – pioneered helicopters
• Ozires Silva – founder of Embraer
• Herbert Smith – designer of the Sopwith Triplane
• Sir Tom Sopwith – Sopwith Aviation Company
• Harrison Storms – directed North American Aviation's Apollo Program
• Joe Sutter – chief engineer for the Boeing 747
• Victor Szebehely – aerospace engineering and celestial mechanics

  T

• Kurt Tank – design engineer for Focke-Wulf
• Max Taitz – scientist in aerodynamics and flight testing of aircraft, one of the founders of the Gromov Flight Research Institute
• Clarence Gilbert Taylor – designer of the Piper Cub
• Moulton Taylor – experimental aircraft pioneer
• Theodore Theodorsen – aerodynamicist at NACA
• Richard Truly – former astronaut and head of NASA
• Andrei Tupolev – founder of OKB Tupolev

  U

V

• Richard VanGrunsven – prolific kit aircraft engineer
• Aurel Vlaicu
• Wernher von Braun – German rocket pioneer
• Theodore von Kármán
• Hans von Ohain
• Traian Vuia – first flight with no other ground devices

  W

• Dwane L. Wallace – early Cessna CEO and designer
• Sir Barnes Wallis
• Ken Wallis MBE – autogyro
• Hellmuth Walter – rocket engines
• Johanna Weber
• Günter Wendt – McDonnell Aircraft and North American Aviation engineer; pad leader, prepared all crewed Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo spacecraft and sealed all crewmembers in for launch.
• Fred Weick
• Daniel Weihs
• Edward Curtis Wells
• Richard Whitcomb
• Ed White – Apollo 1 fire victim on January 27, 1967
• Sir Frank Whittle – pioneer of the jet engine
• Stanisław Wigura
• Oswald S. Williams Jr.
• Steve Wittman – air-racer and aircraft designer
• Wright brothers – made first powered airplane flight on Dec 17, 1903 at Kitty Hawk, NC

  X

• Qian Xuesen

  Y

• Alexander Sergeyevich Yakovlev – founder of OKB Yakovlev
• Chuck Yeager – test pilot and first to break the sound barrier

  Z

• Engelbert Zaschka – one of the first German helicopter pioneers
• Ferdinand von Zeppelin
• Henri Ziegler – father of the Airbus program
• Robert Zubrin