Kurt Debus

Kurt Debus was a German-American rocket engineer who served as the first director of NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, a position he held from the center's creation in 1962 until 1974, overseeing all Apollo and early Space Shuttle-era launch operations from the site. He began his career in Germany working under Wernher von Braun on the V-2 rocket program at Peenemunde during the Second World War, and after being brought to the United States through Operation Paperclip he continued working with von Braun's rocket team on the Redstone and Jupiter missile programs at Cape Canaveral and Huntsville, Alabama, becoming one of the principal architects of American launch site engineering and range safety procedures. As Kennedy Space Center's director he was responsible for the design and construction of the Launch Complex 39 pad and Vehicle Assembly Building facilities used for the Saturn V, and he gave the final clearance for numerous historic Apollo launches, working in close coordination with launch director Rocco Petrone.