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Dr. John E. Zipse, a much respected member of the Galileo family, died of a heart arrhythmia on February 8 at age 47. He was the Galileo Flight System Development Office Manager for the Galileo Project and the Manager of the High Speed Spacecraft Simulation (FASTSIM) Task for JPL. In the former position, he managed the development of the new Galileo spacecraft software for CDS, AACS, and the SSI subsystems. In the latter position, he led a team to implement bit-level high-speed spacecraft simulations of the Galileo and Cassini spacecraft to support software development and command sequence verification. In 1991, he received the NASA Exceptional Service Medal.
At the time of John's death, the Project was reloading Galileo's entire AACS and CDS operating systems (see story, Reloading the Operating System on Galileo's PC). We owe some of our success in achieving this reload to John's leadership during its development. His foresight and leadership in developing the FASTSIM high-speed simulator for Galileo contributed to the rapid development of the software to be reloaded onto the spacecraft in March 1996.
In 1970, John graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a BA degree in applied mathematics and an MA in theoretical nuclear physics; he received the doctorate degree in experimental high energy physics from the University of California at Berkeley for work done at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center. In 1976, the project he collaborated on was recognized when its leader was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for the discovery of the charmed quark. At the NASA Johnson Space Center (1975-1977) and the Goddard Space Flight Center (1977-1979), he designed and built innovative software and hardware systems.
Posted on the Galileo Project Office bulletin board is this heartfelt tribute: "John's charity, zest for truth, search for peace, and dedication to fun will be greatly missed."