NASA Associate Administrator Jim Free has announced his retirement, effective February 22, 2025.
As associate administrator, Free has been the senior advisor to NASA Acting Administrator Janet Petro and leads NASA’s ten centre directors, as well as the mission directorate associate administrators at NASA HQ in Washington.
He is the agency’s chief operating officer for more than 18,000 employees and oversaw an annual budget of more than USD25 billion.
During his tenure as associate administrator since January 2024, NASA added nearly two dozen new signatories of the Artemis Accords, enabled the first Moon landing through the agency’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative to deliver NASA science to the lunar surface, launched the Europa Clipper mission to study Jupiter’s icy ocean moon, and found molecules containing the ingredients for life in samples from asteroid Bennu delivered to Earth by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification and Security–Regolith Explorer) spacecraft.
“Throughout his career, Jim has been the ultimate servant leader, always putting the mission and the people of NASA first,” said Petro. “A remarkable engineer and a decisive leader, he combines deep technical expertise with an unwavering commitment to this agency’s mission.”
Among the notable contributions during his NASA career, Free also championed a new path forward to return samples from Mars ahead of human missions to the Red Planet, supported the crews living and working aboard the International Space Station as they conducted hundreds of experiments and technology demonstrations, and engaged industry in new ways to secure a public/private partnership for NASA’s VIPER (Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover) mission on the Moon.
“It has been an honour to serve NASA and walk alongside the workforce that tackles the most difficult engineering challenges, pursues new scientific knowledge in our universe and beyond, develops technologies for future exploration endeavours, all while prioritising safety every day for people on the ground, in the air, and in space,” Free said.
Free is the recipient of the Presidential Rank Award, NASA Distinguished Service Medal, NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal, NASA Exceptional Service Medal, NASA Significant Achievement Medal, and numerous other awards.
