Rocket Challenge on Discover

I wonder if he is personally responsible for the export of 80% of special effects jobs out of USA in the last 15 years? It would make his collegue's jobs easier indeed.

A lobbying organization is substantially different from a non-profit which is precluded from lobbying.

A lobbying organization is free to have a form of management that is as common sense as the management of a household, with a head of household, and listening to views of the members, but at some point having both the authority and the responsibility in a single person to declare a position a go. The result was SB724 which had language friendly to ALL forms of rocketry including model rocketry.

If NAR had been involved, it would have taken staff meetings called, BoT meetings, and those meetings only happen twice a year or so, and any interim decisions would have to be made by a three man executive committee, but even those decisions would have to be ratified by a full vote at the next scheduled meeting.

So rapid response is not practical. Exactly as NAR showed in its involvement in the perifery of SB724. But once it got involved, it tried to "take over responsibility" for the bill ARSA authored and proffered, thus "screwing the pooch" to quote a recent former NAR President.

NAR has a long history of similar large-scale screw-ups after asserting itself into regulatory matters. With ATF, with NFPA, with CPSC, and of course with its own internal guidelines similar to NFPA and especially its own internal rules on motor certification and approvals.

One way works, and one way reduces the market size 80%, and invites lawsuits, bad regulatory changes by regulators pissed at the rocket industry visibly led by TRA/NAR, and a variety of other less obvious failure modes caused exclusively by acts and omissions of NAR, all of which are resolvable by a change in management philosophy from autocratic, and by several very simple strokes of the pen to change the rules to something far closer to what they were some 20 years ago.

It is very obvious what the problem is. Well, to everyone except the members of the NAR BoT, who are not exactly brain surgeons, rocket scientists, or even of average practical intelligence as a collective body.

Jerry

snip

Isn't the bottom line that, we all know and accept the responsibility and possibility, that something less than desirable could happen when flying unguided aircraft? Didn't we all know even as the youngest of flyers, that there is a certain small risk involved with this or any other activity, whether it's flying, sports or just walking?

We don't have to watch everything going on but we do have to watch out for each other. We have to be "aware" for our own sakes, as well as for others. Be a-lert! That's what the world needs is more "lerts."

Randy

Yes, exactly. Thank you for ralizing what "can you imagine" means.

Objection noted, as well as my point not lost.

Alan

On Mon, 10 Nov 2003 08:46:59 -0800, Jerry Irvine is alleged to have written:

While I don't remember that happening, I do trust that you are correct in saying that it did happen. I certainly remember you mentioning it before....

However, even with diligent watching of the skies, it is still possible for the LCO to miss seeing an airplane. It is also possible for others to miss seeing it, as well, and fail to point it out to the LCO prior to launch. The fact that it is possible to happen does not make it *likely* to happen, or in any way *policy* to let it happen.

I regularly serve as LCO, Pad Manager, or RSO at large launches at Lucerne. In fact, I spent more than 6 hours last weekend doing those three jobs at ROCStock 18, in 3 2-hour shifts, a few of which ran long.... So, I can speak from experience when I state that, sometimes, it's possible to not see an airplane right away, even when you are diligently looking for them.

I can also state, without equivocation, that it is currently, and has been for as long as I have been flying with them, standard policy and practice for every club I have flown with (ROC, SCRA, and Tripoli Vegas) to hold for aircraft, and to also hold for *reports* of aircraft, even if the LCO can't see them. If anyone yells "Airplane!" or "Plane!" or "Hold! Aircraft!" or anything vaguely similar to the LCO, the LCO *will* stop launching until he determines, for himself, that the aircraft is well away from, and heading further away from, the area.

I have, on one or two occasions, seen cases where nobody saw an approaching aircraft until the rocket was already in the air, despite looking. Sometimes, a jet at 30,000 feet will be hard to notice, and people will fail to spot it, despite looking. However, a mistake like that, while regrettable, is nearly irrellevant, for very valid statistical reasons.

First, almost all flights, even at large HPR launches like ROCStock and LDRS, are to much lower altitudes. I'd be willing to stand by an estimate that at least 3/4 of all flights flown last weekend at ROCStock 18 (with waiver windows to 15K' AGL, and a standing waiver of over 5K' AGL) were under 3500' AGL. I'd estimate that less than 1% went over 5000' AGL.

Second, most airplanes fly at much higher altitudes. 20K' - 30K' is typical. The few that do come in low, tend to be *dead simple* to spot, such as the couple of private planes (Cessnas?) and ultra-lights that came cruising by over the course of the weekend.

Third, the odds of either hitting a plane, or coming close enough to "cause an incident" is astronomically unlikely, even if you were trying. Further, even assuming sufficient power to get high enough, the odds *get worse* proportional to the square of the distance from the launcher (simply imagine the surface area of a series of nested half-spheres centered on the launch pad). If it's a million-to-one shot to hit a moving target 1000 feet up, it's a 900 million-to-one shot at 30,000 feet, 30 times as far away.

Bottom line: on the whole, we hobbyists do a damn good job of watching out for airplanes. Occasionally, despite multiple sets of eyes scanning the skies, one flies over before we notice it. Even when that happens, it's astronomically unlikely that anything bad will happen as a result.

Quitcher bitching.

- Rick "Get over it" Dickinson

On 10 Nov 2003 23:08:44 -0800, snipped-for-privacy@direcway.com (Michael Newton) is alleged to have written:

Yes, it was.

"Amateur rocketry", to anyone not already well-versed in the silly terminology minutiae of this hobby, means exactly the same thing as "amateur (foo)" to the general public, for any value of (foo). It simply means non-professional (foo).

What the Rocket Challenge shows highlighted was a bunch of non-professionals flying rockets. Thus, it was very accurate to refer to it as "amateur rocketry".

This is *exactly* the right message to project, too: "This is a hobby that's open to non-professionals. YOU can fly rockets."

- Rick "Amateur rocketeer" Dickinson

Rick "Get over it" Dickinson wrote:

I can imagine all sorts of things. The human mind has a tremendous talent for creating fantasy. The problem comes when people mistake fantasy scenarios for realistic possibilities.

I certainly recongnize that there are multiple agendas.

But, I think MY concerns are for the harm being done to the hobby. Look at what you are facing now:

- unwillingness to compromise and intransigence about following reasonable explosives laws, and looking for a free pass, are getting you a whole raft of restrictive regulations.

- Complete unwillingness to recoginze even the most minimal potential for misuse, are getting you in trouble with HSA (remember all the complaints about not being able to launch your Stinger-missles sized models into closed airspace the day after 3000 people died in a terrorist attack?).

- Encouraging people to build very large motors in their garages using Kitchen-Aid mixers and no safety precautions. And then flying them, untested, near a crowd of 1000 people. While, in the last 2 years, the commercial production of motors under an rigorous industrial safety regime has resulted in the primary factory burning to the ground, and has caused two explosions in the last three months.

- And now, waxing ecstatic about national TV program showing that it's common practice to lawn dart 400 mph, 10 lb+ models made out of graphite/epoxy on either sides of a crowd - AND THEN ARGUING THAT IT'S PERFECTLY REASONABLE, because to do otherwise might defeat (or marginally impinge on) the purpose of having fun.

And you're the one acting "in the interest of the hobby"? Who's gonna screw it up for who?

Of course, it's just my opinion. But unless you address the situations you face in a reasonable, and professional manner, you have no one to blame but yourself for the almost-inevitable result.

Brett

did you really intend to introduce novice rocketeers to this subject? Well, I'm afraid that I cannot let your statement go unchallenged

the pending regulations (NPRM 968) are far from reasonable, as is the proposed law (Hatch-Kohl S.B. 724).

for more information about the fight to exempt all rocketry from the Homeland Security Act, visit

- iz

Brett Buck wrote:

Furthermore both NAR and TRA refuse to follow reasonable exoplosive laws.

Jerry

HA! You've been reading rmr again! ; )

randy

Once I realize that the aircraft in question is a jet cruising at 30K+ feet, I ignore it and get back to flying. Here in the midwest, we're lucky to get waivers to 5-10K, so traffic at 30K is not a problem.

But general aviation aircraft can be a pain. I hate it when I hear something but can't see it. Until I can see what I hear, I don't know if it's a problem or not, therefore I have to assume that it IS. Once I can spot the aircraft near the horizon, heading away, we can go ahead and launch.

The other annoying situation is the plane that is out to "check us out" circling while waiting for us to fly something interesting. And in the process grounding our flights. I can recall some #!%@ at Bong circling overhead for half an hour before he finally left.

Bob Kaplow NAR # 18L TRA # "Impeach the TRA BoD" >>> To reply, remove the TRABoD!

Seems to me it's not your hobby. You said you've "attended" a few high power launches, and (IIRC) you fly modrocs. As far as I can tell, you aren't into high power rocketry.

The high power community _has_ attempted to compromise with ATF on many occasions. It has gotten us nowhere. As for "reasonable explosives laws", I haven't yet seen anything reasonable come out of ATF in regards to rocketry -- particularly since our propellent is not an explosive and our motors are supposed to be exempt as PADs.

On the contrary -- we recognize that the potential for misuse is minimal, at best. We also recognize that freedom means accepting some risks. I prefer freedom to a false sense of "security".

In what way?? I haven't heard anything about anyone in rocketry being "in trouble" as a result of HSA.

Yes, I remember a few folks complained about it. I wasn't one of them. However, I think they had some valid concerns.

If you haven't been there, you don't know whether it was in their garage or what. Nor do you know whether there were any safety precautions. You also know nothing about the skills, knowledge or experience of the people involved. All you know is what little bits you saw on TV.

What happened here?

Bob Kaplow NAR # 18L TRA # "Impeach the TRA BoD" >>> To reply, remove the TRABoD!

UTC plant in South San Jose.

Brett

Brett Buck sez:

I'm talking about high power rocketry. As I pointed out in that same post, you claim you've only been to a high power launch a couple times.

I dismiss it primarily because it's not practical, and partly because the problem isn't as bad as you make it out to be.

First - does this mean that the issues I expressed concern over are not accurate as depicted in the LDRS video? Does the nominal HPR launch in fact have a closed range and overheard protection for those who might have to be in the range? LDRS, or at least the launches edited into the TV show, were weird and strange special exceptions to this basic rule?

If so, then I retract my comments and apologize. If not, then I guess my "lack of experience" really doesn't have any bearing on the comments - so maybe you can come up with a better argument that actually addresses the issue instead of the messenger.

Second - since it appears that HPR launches are run very similarly to ModRoc launches (which is the crux of my complaint, actually) when it comes to range configuration, I figure the 5000+ modroc flights over 36 years, actually do constitute "being part of the hobby".

Never mind I built, test-fired, and flew the mid-range "L" motors (ZnS) in 1975 - successfully. I didn't use as good a safety procedures as I could have, but then again, I was only 15 years old. Never mind that I built and ran (although never flew) a gasoline/nitrous biprop motor in

And please, before you complain about me spouting credentials again

- *you brought it up, not me*.

I'm not trying to destroy HPR; far from it, I think that the "act" had better get cleaned up, or some outside agency is for certain going to clean it up for you. And if you don't like my idea, you're *really* not going to like theirs.

I'm not going to seek it out - but I'm the kind of guy (established aerospace professionals) that regulatory agencies are going to come to for advice and analysis when the hammer is going to drop. They aren't going to pay a lick of attention to long-time participants who have a vested interest in keeping it the same way and vociferously deny the existence of perfectly obvious problems.

Brett