Rick Rezabek, a longtime aerospace engineer in the defense industry and department supporter, has been inducted into the Department of Aerospace Engineering Hall of Distinguished Alumni. He was honored in a department banquet April 6.
Rezabek is a 1980 ISU aerospace engineering graduate and has been a member of the department’s Industrial Advisory Council since 2014.
After receiving his bachelor’s degree Rezabek was quickly hired into Lockheed’s Skunk Works Organization. There, he worked directly in a number of development projects, from concept definition through full-scale development and production. He gained experience as an aerodynamicist and systems engineer with several air vehicle development programs, including the F-117 Nighthawk Stealth Strike Fighter and F-22 Raptor fighter aircraft, and Dark Star ISR (Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance) Unpiloted Aerial Vehicle (UAV) platforms. He performed weapon separation analyses, and flight testing for the F-117 during its full-scale development period. He was the chief engineer of Lockheed Martin’s ASTOVL (Advanced Short Take-Off/Vertical Landing) program and the Joint Strike Fighter program’s X-35 concept demonstrator aircraft from 1993-2000, with responsibility for all technical engineering of the three X-35 variants; and later served as the X-35 product manager from 2000-2001.
He partnered to form Black Ram Engineering LLC, an aerospace engineering services company, in 2001, along with several other engineering and development companies. Black Ram was a major contributor to several other programs, including the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, Boeing InsituRQ-21A Blackjack UAV, and Northrop Grumman’s X-47 UCAS (Unmanned Combat Air System) vehicle.
Rezabek is a part-time consultant and stewards an award-winning 1937 Stinson SR-9F Reliant as pilot and owner.