Nicola Pecile

Nicola Pecile (born March 11, 1973, Udine  ) is an Italian commercial astronaut who works for Virgin Galactic.

He graduated from the Accademia Aeronautica and served with the Aeronautica Militare (Italian Air Force) flying Panavia Tornado combat aircraft. Selected to train as a test pilot, he qualified at the EPNER school in 2003. As a test pilot, he tested new armament integrations for the Tornado and AMX International AMX He completed a master's degree in Astronautical Engineering at the School of Aerospace Engineering of La Sapienza, Rome.

In 2011, he retired from the air force and migrated to the United States. There, he taught at the National Test Pilot School in Mojave, California. In 2015, he joined Virgin Galactic to work on the SpaceShipTwo program.

As of 2023, he had logged 8,000 flying hours on 170 different aircraft.