Mr. O'Connell is the Director, Ground Support Systems for the Integrated Defense Systems, Support Systems business segment at Boeing - St. Louis. His organization of nearly 500 people is responsible for the design and development of all types of support equipment for military aircraft, spacecraft, and missiles for all aircraft and missile programs at Boeing - St. Louis. In this capacity he manages all the mechanical and electrical support equipment for AV-8, F- 15, F/A- 18, and T-45 aircraft, thermal and fluids support equipment for the International Space Station, missiles support equipment and the automated non-destructive inspection systems. He has chaired the Boeing support equipment Business Assessment Team that has responsibility for coordinating support equipment business activities throughout all Boeing defense sectors.
Mr. O'Connell has been employed at Boeing for over 40 years where he has held a wide range of leadership positions. He began his career with the then McDonnell Douglas company designing and developing support equipment for the F-4 Phantom. In subsequent assignments, he was responsible for both support equipment and maintenance trainers for Production Aircraft Programs (AV-8, F-15, and T-45) at McDonnell Douglas. This included management of a large, multidisciplined team of engineers and supporting personnel that defined support equipment requirements, designed or managed subcontract design/manufacture, and performed the subsequent development, documentation, test and integration of the hardware and software for support of aircraft and missile systems. Other prior assignments include a stint as the Chief Engineer of F-15 SE/Trainers.
Mr. O'Connell received his BSEE and MSEE degrees from St. Louis University. He is a member of the NDIA Systems Engineering Division and is a former Co-Chair of the NDIA Automatic Testing Committee. He is a member of the AIAA and a long time member of the IEEE and is active in both the Instrumentation & Measurement Society and the Aerospace & Electronic Systems Society. For the past several years, he was a member of the IEEE AUTOTESTCON Board of Directors (2000-2005) and served as Chairman of that board for the final two years. He has also served as the Vice Chairman for Autotestcon 2001 that was held in Valley Forge, PA. in August 2001.
Joe and his wife, Jary, reside in Wildwood, Missouri.