Attracted by its focus on model rockets, I took a summer class on physics at Macalester College in my early teens. What a blast—literally! I really enjoyed learning about force, mass, acceleration and all the other aspects underlying aerospace. (Keep in mind this being the height of the 1960s race to the Moon.) But the best part was building a scale model of the Saturn V featuring multiple solid propellant motors and a parachute recovery system. For the grand finale of our class, we successfully launched our rocket. The parachute did deploy. However, our ship drifted over Saint Paul’s magnificent urban forest (soon to be decimated by Dutch elm disease) and got hopelessly hung up 100 feet overhead.
These great memories from my youth came back to me earlier this year when asked for advice on validating the OpenRocket simulator. The question came in from a mentor using Stat-Ease® 360 software on a low-cost educator license to support a high-school rocket club achieve the American Rocketry Challenge goals for altitude and flight duration. I happily deferred this request for stat help to my colleague Joe—a physics PhD who plays a dual role providing statistical advice and programming. Without getting into the details (after all, this is rocket science!), suffice it to say that, yes, our DOE software does provide “the right stuff.”
By the way, just last week a NASA sounding rocket carrying student experiments reached an altitude of 70 miles. See the video for the launch. (I advanced it to the countdown. After the blast off, move on. That is the only exciting bit.)
What I find most amazing is that the nose cone on this rocket can carry up to 80 plastic cubes as payload. These accommodate experiments by 11-18 year old students. Check out this Cubes in Space STEM program. Page down to the BREAKING NEWS about an important discovery made by a group of elementary students from Ottawa. I recommend you watch the CTV video—very impressive to hear from such science-savvy grade-schoolers. They will go far!