Friday had a slow start for rockets. A combination of the lack of rocket readiness and a cloudy sky delayed our start until about 11:30 when the first vehicle lifted off. SystemsGo was able to load 24 out of 25 rockets listed on the schedule onto the rails and launched all 24. The 25th was an abort by one of the schools.
The schedule boasted an array of interesting vehicle designs and colors. All 24 left the rail, some with picture perfect flights and a few with rather short flights landing quickly again in the field around the launch pad. These at least were easy for Recovery to locate and bring in for the students.
A Gifted and Talented class from Fredericksburg Junior High came out to get a tour and view the launches for a while this morning.
Embry Riddle University had a representative there with a booth of information, hoping to encourage students to pursue engineering education through them.
There was one particular rocket with a very different fin configuration today. Unfortunately I cannot remember the rocket’s actual name, but we all nicknamed it the Windmill. It was designed by Marble Falls High school and sported two sets of fins the larger of which gave it the appearance of a windmill fan. We were all quite interested in the launch of this vehicle since we hadn’t seen fins like this before, and were curious as to how they would perform. Below is the vehicle in stage 3.
The next sequence is from their launch. Shortly after lift off the large fins sheared off, raining down around the Pad, but the smaller fins carried the vehicle to a significant height before it nosed over and headed back down. Chute did deploy but the body separated from the chute and landed just inside the fence of the launch field, and the nose cone and chute landed on the ground across the fence about 50 yards. It really wasn’t a bad launch for the unusual rocket.
Unfortunately I don’t seem to have gotten a picture of the body tube after recovery. It was a fascinating launch, that we were all waiting to see, so I thought I would share it here as well.
That concludes the fun for Friday. Join us at the launch site again tomorrow for more action. Saturday will be our last day this year. There are no Sunday launches.
Below is the launch schedule for tomorrow, Saturday. There are 7 schools launching a total of 22 rockets tomorrow.
| School Name / Teacher | 1/1 | Trans |
| Akins HS John Sayce |
3 | 4 |
| Alamo Heights HS Colin Lang |
4 | |
| Birdville CTAL Conner Gorman |
3 | |
| London HS Toni Castle |
1 | |
| Manor HS Will Davis |
1 | 1 |
| Northwest HS Elizabeth Mitias |
2 | 1 |
| RL Turner HS Brian Morrill |
2 | |
| Schools Launching 7 | ||
| Totals | 12 | 10 |
| Total Rockets | 22 |
The following is a link to the album of pictures from today’s launch. Have a look you and your school rocket just might be in there.
https://www.facebook.com/ginger.burow
Good luck to all the schools launching on Saturday. I will update the blog after we complete our day again tomorrow. Here is the link to the live stream again.
http://livestream.com/systemsgo
Please remember that although there is no charge for the event, and these launches are open to public viewing, parking and seating is limited due to safety requirements. For this reason, SystemsGo has a provided a link for you to pre-order tickets for those in your party. This also provides SystemsGo with a way to monitor the number of people in attendance each year. This is in no way meant to discourage your attendance, but is instead to help them provide a great experience for students and spectators, while doing all possible to monitor safety issues and attendance numbers at any one time during the launches.
http://www.systemsgo.org/events/
Event details will be available here each day of the event. Daily reports featuring schedules, school names, results, pictures and some editorial content will also be posted.
www.systemsgo.org as always is the place for more information on this program. You may also email them at info@systemsgo.org .Take the time to get your school involved, the future of your students will be greatly benefited.
#SystemsGo #Rockets2017 #FredericksburgSTEMAcademy #Launcher01 #SystemsGoNewMexico
On the Wings of Angels 