Launch Report, January 24-25, 2009

Those who showed up at Bayboro this weekend had a fine time in spite of the poor turnout and the weather. You all know the reason for the relatively poor attendance: all the regulars were at the Astronomy Days event at the Museum of Natural Science in Raleigh [and doing a great job, too! One person who went to the museum on Saturday even made the drive to Bayboro to watch the flying on Sunday.]

A little about the weather and other observations on Nature: It was cloudy both days, but the clouds were stacked rather high and all flights less than about 6000 feet up were clearly visible all the way up and down. When I arrived at the field about 9:30 on Saturday morning, the air was filled with swans, the smaller tundra swans that prefer the east-coast migratory flyways. These are officially an endangered or threatened species, with only 65,000 to 75,000 individuals remaining in the world. But Saturday morning, at least 2 or 3 thousand of these birds were on the field and flying around the field. They are big birds and very noisy, and they fly with an odd flap that looks like their wings have more joints than ducks and geese. There were several blue heron working the banks of the ditches.

The big difference between Saturday and Sunday was the temperature and wind speed. Saturday was up in the 50’s with calm winds in the 3 to 6 MPH range, (absolutely ideal for Bayboro, even the wind direction was optimal.) Sunday morning was another story entirely. When I woke up I could hear the wind over the wheezing and groaning of the heater in the ‘Palace’ motel. Sunday was nasty cold, in the 30’s, humid and clammy, and the wind was so brisk that my eyes watered all day long. Yuck!!

Now some good news! Stew McNabb was back to fly some vintage rockets on some vintage motors and to help out with running the launch. I had to be LCO and RSO all day and Stew gave his time to run the low power pads while I prepped my rocket. Stew must have a house full of little rockets, because he brought out 2 golden oldies I had not seen before: an Estes Skylance which he flew on a B6 and an Estes WAC-Corporal, which flew on a D12. Both flights were close to perfect.

New flyers are always good news! Kevin Murray attended the December launch to observe, and came back with an Aerotech Initiator that he flew several times to great success, learning a lot about average thrust and delay calculations.

Fritz Sprecher has been flying low power for several months with his son Nathaniel and this month he came back with the goal of TRA certification(s). He brought out a brand new, beautifully finished ¼ scale Patriot, and made a fantastic TRA cert one flight. Fritz took the L2 written test Saturday night and flew the Patriot again on Sunday on a Cesaroni J335 that did exactly what it was meant to do! Congratulations to Fritz and welcome to High Power! Nathaniel Sprecher also had a perfect flight with his 1/10 scale Patriot that was painted to match his father’s.

The two K motor flights on Saturday used the same motor. Johnny Hoffman flew Cindy’s Vertical Assault on the Aerotech Redline K695R. The flight to about 8,300 feet was perfect until the main chute failed to deploy and there was some airframe damage. Then, Alan Whitmore flew the Generic Four Inch on a K695R to about 6,700 with perfect recovery.

Tommy Harrell brought out a rocket that he has had in the stable for a while and has been reluctant to fly: The rocket is named Triple-E, which wins this months award for best rocket name because it is a complete double meaning. Triple E is an obvious homonym for Tripoli (in which Tommy is a member), but it also refers to the 3 Estes E9’s that Tommy used to fly this rocket to a perfect flight and recovery.

I have some really, REALLY, good news. Natalie Harrell, who has been flying with us since way back in the Whitakers days, and who has recently certified level 1 (NAR), has been accepted for admission to Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach Florida. This school is widely recognized as the best undergraduate aerospace engineering program in the United States, even more prestigious than the Air Force or Naval Academies. Natalie has shown her abilities through her efforts and successes in the TARC programs and her academic achievments, and I have every confidence that she will excel at E-R, or wherever she chooses to go to college.

Gosh, I got so excited I forgot the motor use summary:

Size	Sat	Sun	Total
½ A	2		2
A	2		2
B	1	1	2
C	2	3	5
D	1		1
E	2		2
F	6		6
G	4		4
H	1		1
I	1		1
J		1	1
K	2		2
Total	24	5	29

Sunday was cold and windy. Not many people showed up and by 2:00 PM they were tired of the weather. The good news is that a new flyer showed up – Matthias Kraehe and his father Frank, from Cary, NC. I think I remember that Matthias made 3 flights with his Astrovision, with the camera set on video mode, but there is only 1 flight card in the deck, perhaps I forgot to make it clear that every flight needs a new flight card. Nathaniel Sprecher made several flights with his Bullpup and Bluebird while his father was prepping for the L2 cert flight. And that was it for Sunday! About the time we had finished packing the trailer, another car pulled up carrying a family who had been to the Astronomy Days event the day before and couldn’t wait until Spring to come on down to Bayboro and watch some flying.

-Alan Whitmore

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