May 25-26, 2002

                The fourth weekend of the month brought fine weather and light winds to Whitakers for our monthly Saturday sport launch and Sunday Experimental launch.  Apparently, a lot of people thought that the Memorial Day weekend would be a great time to fly some rockets, because we had a lot of flyers show up who had not been to Whitakers before, or hadn't come out for a long time.  Both days were very well attended.

                First a breakdown of what size motors were flown:

                There were three successful certification flights this weekend, also.  Bryan Miller certified level 1 with an H180W in his Big Mama, and Russell Snyder made another successful level 1 flight with his rocket Bob flown on an I218R.  Eric Fadely used a J350W to certify level 2 with his rocket called Der Red Max. 

                One of the major entertainments of the weekend were the fleet of wildly-colored rockets from Ivan Barnsley, who came down from Maryland (I think).   Ivan's rockets were consistently bizarre in their design, and very creative.  He has built one of the best ring-tailed whistling rockets that I have ever heard.

                The crowds thinned out for Sunday's experimental launch, but the excitement level was very high.  Only 2 CATO's:  Names will be withheld to protect the guilty, suffice it to say that Sunday was marred by one very small and one very large explosion.

                I hope you all have a fabulous June and a good time at LDRS (if you are going) and I will see you again in July.    

                Alan Whitmore