Darwyn Banks

Darwyn Banks is the Director, Systems Engineering Directorate, National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). He is responsible for all Systems Engineering and Systems Engineering Management processes at the NRO including mission assurance, independent programmatic assessments, quality, reliability, corporate technical standards, supply chain, and joint oversight of industrial base challenges impacting multiple agencies’ space system acquisitions. Prior to his civilian service, Mr. Banks concluded more than 26 years as a space officer in the Department of the Air Force.

Mr. Banks received his military commission via the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps. Following Undergraduate Space Training in Colorado, he reported to his first assignment as a missile warning officer in North Dakota. He rose to become Chief of Standardization & Evaluation for all crew personnel despite being the squadron’s most junior officer. Thereafter he led a team of 18 enlisted personnel running 24/7 operations of the Onizuka AFB command post in Silicon Valley. Departing the Bay Area for academia, Mr. Banks double-majored to receive master’s degrees in Computer Science and Space Systems from the Air Force Institute of Technology in Ohio. He then applied this knowledge while serving as Chief Systems Engineer of the Overhead Collection Management Center supporting both the Department of Defense (DoD) and Intelligence Community (IC) in Fort Meade, Maryland.

Mr. Banks served as Executive Officer to the Director, Signals Intelligence Acquisitions and Operations Directorate at NRO headquarters in Chantilly, Virginia. Then followed consecutive internships as a program manager for both the U.S. Department of Commerce and the General Services Administration before reporting to Air Command and Staff College. Mr. Banks subsequently demonstrated innovative tactics, techniques and procedures for information operations at the Air Force Information Warfare Battlelab. During his military career Mr. Banks commanded the Operations Squadron at RAF Menwith Hill in the United Kingdom as well as the Aerospace Data Facility Southwest and its Space Operations Group in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

After retirement from active duty, Mr. Banks supported NASA as Chief Architect for the Space Communications & Navigation (SCaN) Program’s Earth Regimes Network Evolution Study exploring future communications systems to follow launch of the final, Shuttle-era Tracking & Data Relay Satellite (TDRS). From NASA Mr. Banks returned to the NRO as a plankholder of its newly established personnel cadre. He later capitalized on the combined research and development strengths of both the IC and DoD overseeing acquisitions, program management and other efforts for the Office of Naval Intelligence before assuming his current duties.