Launch Reports

Blazing through the desert with the bluest rocket of them all: Blue Ridge Blazer.

     A love for the project, a need for competition, and a driven passion. WVUER (West Virginia University Experimental Rocketry) participated in the 15th annual Spaceport America Cup with their 30,000ft Student Researched and Designed rocket Appalachian Sunset and Space Dynamics Laboratory Payload Challenge ScatterSat. The competition team traveled out to Las Cruces, New Mexico for the 7 day competition. The team and rocket was to be evaluated on their project, presentation of the rocket’s information, and overall performance of the system to be ranked within their own category, and ranked among 99 other teams from 24 countries. 

     Typical weather conditions in Las Cruces are mostly sunny and warm with a side of chilly nights. In an unusual weather occurrence, Las Cruces saw a slight increase in rain come through the week of the competition than it has seen in the past for June. The first allowable day of flights, Tuesday, June 21st, was washed out due to the rain turning the vertical launch area (VLA) into a muddy slip and slide. Instead of turning the day into a complete loss, the team was able to finish the rocket’s flight safety review of the motor at the horizontal launch area (HLA) with ESRA judges, finish up last minute changes to the rocket, and go through the preflight and motor checklists to make sure all information was written out to avoid missing steps and allow for learning from the scheduled 2022 Kansas test flight.