Oh and... I'm too tired!

And... that's why the launch logs haven't been posted yet. Give Joe some time to sift through the flight sheets. 😉 It was cool, wasn't it?

I missed Sponge Bob. Dang.... When did it go up?
I was only there for long enough to do the L2 stuff and see Mike & John's flights. AMAZING!
My wife sitting at the airport waiting to be picked up is a baaaaad thing, so I had to leave early...... I did manage to make the mile hi club though, 7012' on the Black Brant Vb (J350), single deploy - one good way to do a L2 I guess.
Greg

Don't look for the logs for a day or three - Joe just got home around 7:30 and is exhausted.

There were many great flights this weekend. John Wilke's I altitude attempt at 13K+ though he didn't quite make the necessary 2% over the existing TRA record, he did up the club record a tad (over his own record). Cliff Hohenstein's L3 cert flight - made possible by a team of utterly selfless Colorado Rocketeers, Giant Leap Rocketry and others will certainly go down in history as one of this hobbies finest moments. Kyle Parson's nearly O Research flight this morning to nearly 19K. My own jinx-breaker and first real flight since 2006 on an L1300. Adrian Adamson's attempt on John Wilke's world G altitude record... and many, many more.

This was a great event, despite the horrible weather on Thursday and Friday, late setup on Saturday, and a couple other very minor glitches. A more thorough event report will be posted in a couple days.

Warren

Well-said, Warren! And don't forget Jon Scuba's L3 on that glorious moonburner... man, a 10 second burn is a long time! One of the "glitches" was how long it took--Saturday anyway--to get people to a pad. Elvis (Eric), Kyle, and I tried to get that done, but it wasn't working too well from noon to 2:30 PM. We really did do our best. I remember being called in to manage a pad earlier, but with my hands the way they are, I couldn't. Kyle tried to manage both ranges by himself, but that's not possible. What we may need to do is go to Joe or Ed and say we're understaffed and halt the launch until people step up. As really fantastic as the launch was, we're not there yet. We NEED FOUR people on staff: LCO, RSO, and two pad managers. The biggest delay was not having the right rods or rails. That being said, we need to define CLEARLY what each position entails. Traditionally, an RSO checks rockets and signs off, the LCO checks the range and sky and pushes the button, the pad managers make sure that all rods and rails are in place as needed... but who assigns the rods and rails? IF it’s left to the LCO, there is no time to do his or her job properly. I don’t know if I was correct, but I tried to assign the pads… though it isn’t possible to do that and check the rockets under a crowd either. Last Oktoberfest, I RSO'd AND was left to manage both ranges.... though it was slow enough and manageable.

It was GREAT to see JW again. I wish I could have been there Sunday to see Argos fly. JW, don't retire that bird yet! Next month, your L3, Warren!

Jon's flight was already mentioned Bruce - I was trying to bring up a couple other highlights besides.

You make a couple good points Bruce - same stuff I've been saying for a couple years. This year really brought the pad management issue to the fore and also, perhaps more importantly, point out the need for someone to manage the crowd at the RSO table. The RSO needs to focus on the rockets, not handling the crowd.

The way I see it is the LCO is launching birds and acting as something of master of ceremonies and the overall decision maker organizing what's going on out at the pads and in getting people out to the pads. The RSO is safety checking rockets - exclusively. There needs to be a pad manager at the Estes Pads AND at the high power pads. Finally, there needs to be a crowd manager at the gate working closely with all the above to keep people moving efficiently. Also, perhaps, announcements need to be made if all those roles aren't filled. Not everyone who can launch rockets can handle managing all the other folks we need out there. Perhaps there needs to be a change in procedure where the flyer doesn't turn over the flight card until AFTER they are on the pad.

I also think that the extra rank of pads behind the Estes pads was an idea that while it had some merit, caused a few problems for us in that we had insufficient high power pads on range left and added choice for both range personnel and flyers that caused some additional delay all around.

This is definitely a topic that needs more discussion AND most especially, needs people to step up and fill these roles. The Executive Committee needs to make this a serious topic of discussion and also be very proactive about recruiting folks for these roles and getting follow-thru.

Warren