Massimo Trella


Massimo Trella was an Italian engineer, with a Master degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering, who has held numerous prestigious institutional positions in Italy and abroad in the space exploration field. He was a member of ASI, director of ESTEC and Inspector General of ESA.

Biographical notes

Massimo Trella was born in Rome on April 2, 1932 from Serafino and Amalia De Rosa. Second child after Giustino and before Chiara, he led his childhood in Rome in the Coppedé district.
He graduated from the Liceo Classico T. Tasso in 1950 and then enrolled at the University of Rome La Sapienza, Faculty of Engineering, graduating in 1956 first in Mechanics and then in 1958 the cum Laude degree in Aeronautical Engineering at the Aerospace Engineering School. After his academic studies he did his military service at the Aeronautical Engineers as a second lieutenant.
He married Anna Mazzarini on November 28, 1959, by whom he had two daughters, Cristina and Susanna.

Teaching and research activity

M. Trella soon after graduating became an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering. Later he left for the United States in the early 1960s at the request of prof. Antonio Ferri of the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, Freeport N.Y as assistant professor and then associate professor in the Aeronautics & Applied Mechanics department. The institute housed a major aerospace research laboratory built with the support of the NASA. In parallel with his teaching he did research studies and publications in the field of hypersonic flows of real gases, reentry configurations, thermal protection systems'', mechanics of the flight'' of satellites.
In 1964 he returned to Italy starting a collaboration at the La Sapienza University of Rome, obtaining the free teaching in Aerodynamics in 1965. From this moment he became full professor for the courses of Aerology and Rarefied Gas Dynamics at the School of Aerospace Engineering in Rome.
In the same year 1964 he was hired by the CNR of Rome as Chief Researcher, becoming director of the Space Activities Service in 1971, a position he held until 1973. During the period of work at the CNR he devoted himself to the SIRIO project, the first satellite of Italian communication, with the aim of promoting and coordinating the participation of Italian companies and institutions in the related cooperation programs. In parallel with his research and teaching activities, M. Trella worked as a consultant in the aerospace field for the Minister of Scientific Research Camillo Ripamonti.

Career at the Space Agencies

In 1965 M. Trella began his activity as a technical member of the Italian delegation in various international programs. He was appointed vice president of the Technical Planning Staff at the CETS in London, and later Italian Delegate to the boards of the Space Societies ELDO, ESRO and CSE and by the latter he was entrusted with the first exploratory survey for a US-Europe cooperation after the Apollo program.
From 1969 he was appointed consultant for the Italian Minister of Scientific Research and secretary of the CIAs and joined the study committee on the aeronautical industry at the Ministry of Economy for the definition of the government plan of economic investments.
In 1973 he was elected vice president of ESRO and president of the Spacelab Program Committee.
In January 1975 he was appointed technical inspector of the newly established European Space Agency based in Paris and in July 1978 technical director of ESTEC in Noordwijk. He will hold this role until 1998 to take up the post of Inspector General of ESA at the Organisation headquarters in Paris.
Leaving ESA due to age limits in 2000, he returns to Italy for being consultant to ASI until 2002.