Systems Administrator III-IV - UPDATED

Associated Universities Inc • Socorro, NM

5d • Hybrid

About The Position

The National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) is seeking an experienced Systems Administrator (Level III or IV, based on qualifications) to maintain the Red Hat Enterprise Linux infrastructure supporting the end-to-end science data pipeline for NRAO’s flagship observatories. This senior role combines deep systems expertise with operational ownership, mentoring, and direct contribution to mission-critical science delivery. The position is based in Charlottesville, VA; Greenbank, WV; Albuquerque or Socorro, NM.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Astronomy, Physics, or equivalent professional experience.
• At least four years of progressive responsibility in mission-critical or scientific computing environments.
• Expert in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8/9.
• Proficient in modern infrastructure automation and orchestration: Ansible Automation Platform (playbooks, collections, Execution Environments).
• Proficient in GitOps workflows using ArgoCD or Flux.
• Proficient in production container platforms (Kubernetes/OpenShift and Docker Swarm).
• Skilled in Python 3 automation and SQL (PostgreSQL, Oracle, MySQL) for monitoring, reporting, and system health.
• Experienced with Telegraf, Prometheus, and alerting systems in operational settings.
• A clear communicator capable of translating complex technical conditions into concise updates for astronomers, project leads, and senior management.
• Strong communication skills (written and verbal).
• Ability to remain calm while supporting demanding clients.
• Analytical thinker.
• Ability to learn new systems quickly.
• Must be authorized to work in the United States.
• The Observatory presently cannot sponsor H-1B Visas for this position.

Nice To Haves

• Direct experience with high-data-rate scientific pipelines (radio astronomy, genomics, earth observation, or similar).
• Working knowledge of VictoriaMetrics, Ceph, SLURM, Prometheus/Grafana/Loki stacks.
• Familiarity with both agile (Scrum/Kanban) and traditional waterfall project methodologies.
• RHCE or RHCA certification strongly preferred.

Responsibilities

• Contribute to the design, implementation, and lifecycle management of RHEL-based systems supporting processing and archival science data flows across global observatories.
• Lead the transition to GitOps-driven infrastructure and application deployment, striving for consistency, auditability, and reproducibility.
• Migrate legacy science services from Docker Swarm to future environments based in kubernetes.
• Develop and maintain automation tools in Python and SQL to monitor data pipeline health, generate operational metrics, and trigger reliable alerts.
• Serve as Level-3 escalation for production incidents; conduct root-cause analysis, author post-mortem reports, and implement preventive measures.
• Triage and resolve escalated support tickets, providing timely, astronomer-facing status communications during incidents.
• Participate in agile development cycles (2-week sprints, daily stand-ups, Jira/Confluence) to deliver measurable improvements in stakeholder projects.
• Validate software releases, prepare deployment packages, and produce comprehensive user documentation and training materials.
• Contribute to the NRAO Common Computing Environment (CCE) initiative for cross-site standardization and knowledge transfer.
• Mentor junior and peer administrators in infrastructure-as-code, automation, and operational best practices.
• Travel occasionally to NRAO sites, including the Very Large Array (VLA), Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, and international operations centers.

Benefits

• 13 holidays
• Annual accrual of up to 24 vacation days
• 15 sick days
• Additional time off for doctor/dentist visits
• 8 weeks of paid parental leave
• Medical, dental and vision plans
• Retirement benefit contributes an amount equal to 10 percent of a qualified participant’s base pay with no required employee contribution
• Optional supplemental, tax-deferred plan for employee retirement contributions

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level