This weekend, our local Seattle area rocket club (Washington Aerospace Club, or WAC) held a small launch event at 60 Acres Field, a park that’s roughly a 30 min drive from where we live. We decided to stop by and check it out, and I brought along the Mean Machine and some E motors. This was the first time I’d been to a club launch and it was a great experience – it was well organized and coordinated, with a carefully set up range area and a range safety officer (RSO) in charge.

I didn’t know quite what to expect but they’d already set up all the launch pads and equipment, which made things really easy. Several dozen people attended, including families and young children, some to launch and others just to spectate. There were some really impressive rockets out there. Other groups were on the field too, aside from our club members – several groups of students were there for the Team America Rocketry Challenge, or TARC, so rockets were constantly in the air.

I was able to launch the Mean Machine with an E motor twice – the first launch and recovery was a textbook success, while the second was… more interesting. More on that in my next post. But I also plan to upload some video clips from the event!