SSP Recognizes SPA President with Lifetime Achievement Award.
Rear Adm. Terry Benedict, director of the Navy’s Strategic Systems Programs (SSP), presented Phillip E. Lantz with the Fleet Ballistic Missile (FBM) Lifetime Achievement Award during a ceremony May 9th. Mr. Lantz is the President and CEO of Systems Planning and Analysis, Inc. (SPA), headquartered in Alexandria, Va.
The award recognizes “significant lifetime contributions in the field of science and engineering that have been pivotal to the development and success of the FBM Strategic Weapons System,” according to a letter presented with the award.
Mr. Lantz’s association with the FBM program began in 1960, when Ensign Lantz was one of 100 members of the first submarine school to include Ensigns since World War II. After qualifying in submarines, he was assigned as Assistant Navigator on the Ballistic Missile Submarine USS TECUMSEH while it was being built. Mr. Lantz left the Navy in 1964, and began working with Strategic Programs (SP) as part of the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab in 1965. His support of Strategic Weapons System programs has continued uninterrupted since then. He founded SPA in 1972, and has worked directly with 11 of the 13 SSP Directors.
In his remarks, Mr. Lantz thanked the many people he has worked with in SSP over the years, several SPA division directors, and his wife, Paula, for her 51 years of support. Mrs. Lantz also received a certificate from the Program, thanking her for her contributions to “SSP, the Navy, and our Nation.”