A modest proposal... or Jerry Irvine saves the Universe

The only thing that can change the direction of the NAR is involvement (i.e. volunteering) of the membership. Would either of you like to volunteer to do the work that you feel is so important?

Mario Perdue NAR #22012 Sr. L2 for email drop the planet

"X-ray-Delta-One, this is Mission Control, two-one-five-six, transmission concluded."

Spoken like a true gentleman. Your name on the ballot?

What you don't about me and what I do would fill volumes. Winky or not, your answer is a knee-jerk troll response.

Rocky Firth NAR 55487

I am willing to do what is necessay. Watch and see.

Rocky Firth NAR 55487

No my name is not, of course I'm not running down the NAR leadership..

.-- "knee-jerk troll response", I love it. "What I don't know about you and what you do, would fill volumes", go ahead impress me/us; we are all ears..or are you just another one of those anonymous posters worried about professional reprisal for what you might say on an open forum???

Fred

comments inline shockie B)

Evidently the right and left hands of the NAR don't know what each are doing because according to Mr. Miller, Estes has such a reference which is available via Mary Roberts.......Heck, according to the NAR website 48 states have adopted NFPA1122 so evidently somebody in the NAR knows what states have at least adopted NFPA 1122....I would take an educated guess that CA is one of the 2 that has not.......wonder who the other one is?

well rocketry interests represent 7 of the 31 slots on the NFPA PYRO-AAA Technical Committee and from reading the past revisions of 1122 and 1127, it appears to me that most votes are 27-4 or 31-0......

ahh Mark...as NFPA Liasion what exactly does J.Patrick Miller do? If hes so "occupied" then perhaps he should consider resigning and you can then appoint somebody who is not so occupied.....again this is just a variation of the "busy volunteer" canard..... hasn't the NAR been around now for 46 years? You would think that in all that time somebody who was the chair of that committee would have collected this info...... I might add that I have emailed the Staff Liasion of this committee asking for such a listing..... Since J.Patrick Miller is our NFPA rep and probably knows this person in person, I just assumed that he could better facilitate my request? I mean its been my experience that people in the know can get more accomplished than complete strangers can......

Why is it when ever I ask for something from the NAR I am told to volunteer myself and do it myself? Agin this is just another way of saying shutup and go away.....

States that have adopted the IFC which adopts NFPA 1122/1125/1127

Alaska Arkansas Florida Georgia Idaho Indiana Minnesota New Jersey New York North Carolina South Carolina Utah Virginia Washington Wyoming

NFPA 1122, 1125 and 1127 are explicity referenced in 'Chapter 34 - Explosive and Fireworks' of the Intl Fire Code (IFC) :

"§3401.1.4 Rocketry. The storage, handling, and use of model and high powered rockets shall conform with the requirements of NFPA 1122, NFPA 1125, and NFPA 1127."

In addition the State of Kentucky Has adopted NFPA 1 which also adopts NFPA

1122/1125/1127 by reference from Chapter 65:

NFPA 1

65-5 Model Rocketry. The design, construction, limitations of propellant mass and power, and reliability of model rocket motors and model rocket motor reloading kits and their components produced commercially for sale to or use by the public for purposes of education, recreation, and sporting competition shall comply with NFPA 1122, Code for Model Rocketry. 65-6 Rocketry Manufacturing. 65-6.1 The manufacture of model rocket motors designed, sold, and used for the purpose of propelling recoverable aero models shall comply with NFPA 1125, Code for the Manufacture of Model Rocket and High Power Rocket Motors. 65-6.2 Permits, where required, shall comply with 1-12.16. 65-7 High Power Rocketry. 65-7.1 The design, construction, limitations of propellant mass and power, and reliability of all high-power rocket motors and motor components produced commercially for sale to or use by the certified user for education, recreation, and sporting competition shall comply with NFPA 1127, Code for High Power Rocketry. 65-7.2 Permits, where required, shall comply with 1-12.16.

I thought you didn't want me to email you anymore with my suggestions,ideas, recommendations as it made you feel I was a potential stalker..................

When I volunteerI get punished.

When I "suggest" I get punished.

It's all about the old guard.

I don't post here often, not worth the hassels.

How long have you been at this? How many fields have you helped set up as open lauch areas? How many Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts have you encourage to persue the hobby beyond the merit badges?

I really don't care how you answer, it doesn't change anything that I am concerned about today.

But for claification, I launched my first rocket in 1963, zinc an sulfer powder. I posted to the CompuServe list when it was new and was on bulletin boards before then.

And the name and the email address are real.

Rocky Firth

you

I don't think this can be done, at least in a useful way.

Please forgive my hitchhike on this post, but I want to expand on something I've posted here and elsewhere before.

Most (but not all) states have in the past based their codes on one of three standard codes [***see note below]. For example, Minnesota adopts the Uniform Fire Code (UFC), with a (relatively few) ammendments. I am most familiar with UFC, but I believe my comments apply to all three standard codes (if anyone takes Mark up on his request, let me know if I am correct :-) UFC, for all of its hundreds of pages of regulations on fire escapes, smoke alarms, nursing home exits, boilers, flammable liquid storage, fire department staffing, hydrant flows, and the like, somehow manages to avoid explicitly addressing the activities of those of us who send relatively cylindrical self-propelled shapes skyward. And Minnesota hasn't seen fit to add any applicable ammendments, either.

"Ah," you say. "NFPA doesn't apply!" Well....not so fast.

UFC Article 1 includes Section 101.3, "Subjects Not Specfically Regulated by this Code", which essentially says that, for such subjects, compliance with an adopted NFPA code is good enough.

So, barring explicit local regulations that restrict rocketry, you can be legal at the state level if you follow NFPA. Note that this is not necessarily sufficient to be legal at the federal level, because the BATFE regulations are more restrictive than NFPA in some areas (magazines in attached garages, for example).

"Great!" you say. "I have to comply with NFPA." Well....not so fast.

Suppose you want to do something that is either prohibited under NFPA, or not addressed at all by NFPA. Are you up a creek? No, at least not yet.

Take EX activities. NFPA 1122 and 1127 says you can't launch rockets with homemade motors. That means that if you do, you can't assert that your activity is legal by involking UFC Article 1 Section 101.3. If you _are_ to be legal, you'd have to comply with different laws, such as those for explosives manufacture. That approach can be way overkill, requiring special facilities, special zoning, etc etc. However, there is an alternative, which is to get a waiver from the local AHJ (and, depending on what you want to do, the FAA, BATFE, etc) which says you can do the activity under whatever conditions they may require. [You can get permission to do all sorts of things that way--that's how the local TRA chapter got permission to stage a high power launch from a big suburban lake here this weekend despite a variety of regulations to the contrary. It took them awhile to get that permission, but they got it! There are similar stories from clubs around the country.]

***But wait, the fun has just begun. The three sponsoring code bodies (BOCA, ICBO and SBCCI) merged into the International Code Council (ICC) and promulgated a new International Fire Code, which is in the process of being adopted pretty much everywhere the old standard codes were. (Go here: and you'll see that there are only about three states that aren't in the process of adopting at least some of the code on at least some level in at least some jurisdictions....you get the point). These codes are similar to, but not yet identical to NFPA codes, but there's hope that there will be more and more commonality as time goes on. However, "adopting" may mean different things in different states (For example, are local authorities allowed to be more lenient than the state authorities? It depends on the state). So every rocketeer will have to keep an eye on their State, County, City, etc lawmakers and keep track of what's changing, and when.

Personally, I find this state of affairs to be messy, illogical, and unscientific, but it does preserve wiggle room--it means that I'm guaranteed to be legal if I comply with NFPA and BATFE. It also means I'm guaranteed to be legal if I comply with the stricter regulations for activities not covered by NFPA. And finally, it means I still have an out if I can educate a local AHJ to grant a waiver. As an aside, there are some people who desire or need to be "guaranteed legal", just as there are people who desire to be "probably not illegal". Generally, the more public the activity, the deeper the pockets involved, and the more litigious the participants, the more folks want to be "guaranteed legal".

But I suspect it also means that there is no clean answer to the question shockwaveriderz was asking, and alas, I also doubt that a relatively small group like NAR can ever compile an atlas of rocket laws that members can use as legal guidance for activities that fall outside all but basic model rocketry (and maybe not even that). It's sort of like asking the AKC to keep track of all the local rules regarding dog ownership. Or the AAA to provide a dictionary of all the ways to get a ticket, anywhere in the U.S.

Even if you could write it once, you'd never keep up with the changes.

In fact, the goal of international codes is to help make it easier to construct such a guide; unfortunately, as shown by recent actions by BATFE, it also means we're more subject to sudden drastic limitations being imposed on our activities.

I think that there is no substitute for each and every rocketeer taking personal responsibility for understanding all of the rules that apply to whatever activities we undertake, wherever we undertake them. It's easy when you're doing something fairly mainstream. It's harder when you're pushing the envelope--but that's precisely when it is most important.

My $.02

--tc

Which is why I also made the call and published many of the results. Some of which "shockie" refers to.

I must have had a bigger mouth, or more credibility.

Someone puts his effort where his words are.

But I ask you, if this was a task you actually undertook, why didn't you follow up on it?

Name the last three votes that didn't go primarilly your way.

Watch.

Jerry

That sounds like "substantial compliance".

This should be in the FAQ.

Seven out of 31? Not exactly a majority, is it?

Seems to me, that only indicates that the revisions must have been developed to a point where they could be accepted by the majority before they were submitted to a vote.

Just out of curiosity, why is this so important to you??

typical

- iz :(

ray: from the NAR website: Who Regulates High Power Rocketry?

High power rockets fall under a different code of regulations known as National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) Code 1127. This is a relatively new code (1995), and so some states have not yet had time to adopt it.

"You should check your own state's laws before attempting to launch high power rockets."

Ray, is it possible that is the NAR had a link specifying which states had adopted NFPA1127 that it may facilitate a person getting involved in HPR? Aren't there enough barriers to HPR now? If a person has to research his own state laws to find out if he can do HPR, do you really think they will? And what about Self_regulation? How can one self-regulate themselves if they don;t know their own state laws? Would it be simplier to compile and make this listing available to all potential HPR modelers on the website?

shockie B)

How were you punished?

Is that like, "sort of pregnant"?

Agreed and based on results to date that is clearly a "bad thing".

By a secret plan to be bombarded by anonymous trolls on usenet?!?

(oh, wait, it's not a secret, is it?)

David Erbas-White

Jerry claims he was "punished" by the NAR. I want to know how he was punished.

It would be, if the government had set things up such that it would be impractical for anyone to actually be "perfectly pregnant"...

-dave w