Former Transportation Exec Ravi Chaudhary Nominated as Assistant Secretary of Air Force for Installations, Energy, & Environment

Ravi Chaudhary, an Indian American former U.S. Air Force pilot. (Twitter photo/@ravichaud)

India-West Staff Reporter

President Joe Biden had announced Oct. 14 his intent to nominate Indian American Ravi Chaudhary as Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Installations, Energy, and the Environment, among five nominations. Chaudhary, Nominee for Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Installations, Energy, and the Environment

Chaudhary previously served as a senior executive at the U.S. Department of Transportation where he was director of Advanced Programs and Innovation, Office of Commercial Space, at the Federal Aviation Administration, according to a White House press release. In this role, he was responsible for the execution of advanced development and research programs in support of the FAA’s Commercial Space Transportation mission. While at DOT, he also served as the executive director, Regions and Center Operations, where he was responsible for integration and support of aviation operations in nine regions located nationwide.

Chaudhary is a former Air Force officer and pilot, serving on active duty from 1993 to 2015. He has completed a variety of operational, engineering, and senior staff assignments in the Air Force. As a C-17 pilot, he conducted global flight operations, including numerous combat missions in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as a ground deployment as director of the Personnel Recovery Center, Multi-National Corps, Iraq. As a flight test engineer, Chaudhary was responsible for flight certification of military avionics and hardware for Air Force modernization programs supporting flight safety and mishap prevention. Earlier in his career, he supported space launch operations for the Global Positioning System and led third stage and flight safety activities to ensure full-operational capability of the first GPS constellation.

As a systems engineer, Chaudhary supported NASA’s International Space Station protection activities to ensure safety of NASA Astronauts. He also served as a member of the President’s Advisory Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders during the Obama Administration. In this role, he advised the president on executive branch efforts to improve veterans support for the AAPI community.

Chaudhary holds a Ph.D. specializing in executive leadership and innovation from the Georgetown University D.L.S. Program, an M.S. in industrial engineering from St. Mary’s University as a NASA graduate fellow, an M.A. in operational arts and military science from Air University, and a B.S. in aeronautical engineering from the U.S. Air Force Academy.

He is a graduate of the Federal Executive Institute, and holds DOD acquisition certifications in program management, test and evaluation, and systems engineering.

Chaudhary hails from Virginia, where he lives with his wife of 25 years, Uma, and their two children.

According to airforcetimes.com, if confirmed by the Senate, Chaudhary would take over a massive portfolio spanning Air Force and Space Force installations worldwide as the service grapples with the effects of deferred maintenance and climate change. He will also have a key role in managing the privatized housing used by airmen and guardians and reforms to how the military does business with those landlords.