The morning of Saturday March 15, 2025 we were greeted with a very low cloud ceiling and thick fog which prevented us from flying. The clouds started to lift around noon and flight operations started as clear skies began to appear.
Setting up and running a launch does not happen without the assistance of volunteers. On this day our normal launch team of Kurt Hesse, Jim Livingston and myself were assisted by Mike McKeon and Brett Michal [with members of ODU Rocketry team]. In addition, thanks to Dennis Hill for covering LCO duties for majority of the day.
We had some successful certification flights starting with Brett Michal’s Level 3 flight for Leo with a M1297. Brett’s flight was perfect and he handled my crooked fins and motor recall comments on the way to the launch pad with ease and learned the best way to light an M is through a “Jim Livingston” Pyrodex supplemented ignitor. Earnest Reager was up next and achieved his Level 2 certification flying Cherokee on a J350. Seth Olanovich flew Rockoon on a I284 for his Level 1 and Daniel Letter flew Access Denied on a H238 also for his Level 1 certification. Congratulations to everyone on these accomplishments.
A couple university teams made the trip down to Bayboro to complete flights and collect data for their respective competitions. ODU Rocketry [IREC] flew Reign on a M1845 and North Carolina Agricultural and Tech [USLI] flew their Franken Rocket on a L1150. Both flights were successful, and the teams were able to collect the data they needed for submission. Both teams learned about bringing spare ignitors supplemented with pyrodex and dowels to ensure proper ignitor placement on larger motors.
Ernest Reager – fresh off his L2 flight – flew Drago3 on a H268. Ralph Malone flew Sudden Rush on an I211 and Quicksilver on a I130. Mike McKeon started things off with an awesome sugar motor – J559 in his Goblin and following this up with a flight of Bob on a K1100 – reaching an apogee of 6317 feet. Brent Bierstedt was back in action flying his Patriot on a J450 and a Saturn V on a F63 which resulted in an “exciting” just-in-time recovery.
Robbie Kirk was back with his Super Multi-roc on an E11. Richard Powers flew Big Bertha on a C5 and Kronos for its first flight on a G74. This was a practice flight for a future L1 attempt. Jason Consrantino flew Darkstar on a I600 for a nominal flight. Ari Seran flew Methuselah on a K535 for another great flight. John Meredith’s Sandhawk suffered a CATO on a H220. Noah Piraino flew Punisher Super Sport on a I210 and James Larman flew Pour Cosmic on a J90 – long burn. Mike Nay flew his Magnum Plus on a K711 and air starting two H135s after main burnout.
There were no flights on Sunday.
Will see you all at the next planned launch weekend : March 29-30, 2025. This will be the last launch of the season until September.
Summary of the motors flown:
| Motor | Saturday | Sunday |
| A | ||
| B | ||
| C | 1 | |
| D | ||
| E | 1 | |
| F | 1 | |
| G | 1 | |
| H | 5 | |
| I | 5 | |
| J | 4 | |
| K | 3 | |
| L | 1 | |
| M | 2 | |
| Total | 24 |
Regards,
Mike Nay
Prefect, NC East Tripoli
