In association with the Ukraine Space Modelling Sports Federation, Noosphere made one more step toward waking up interest into space and rocketry among young Ukrainians. If you saw something flying fast and high near Chernihiv on May 19 — it was probably a rocket launched during the Ukraine Rocketry Challenge: a competition between young rocket enthusiasts.
Both experienced and novice space modelling engineers took part in the competition. 3 winners shared the prize fund of $3500. The team were up to 3 people. Before the first of two rounds of launches, each team presented their rockets. The rocket also needed to have had a safety system to carry a fragile load of two chicken eggs.
Six teams from all over Ukraine registered to participate in the challenge. Only five teams successfully launched in the first round because the Kharkov Rocket Model team couldn’t launch due to technical issues.
After the first round, the securing system of the Space Talent team’s rocket failed and the team wasn’t able to continue. But it is worth mentioning that the construction of the rocket was good enough to save the fragile load from breaking.
After the second round, teams took their places in the tournament standings:
1st place and main prize of UAH 50 000 — Impulse team from Shostka with 59,24 points;
2nd place and UAH 30 000 — Planet team from Nizhyn with 122,94 points;
3rd place and UAH 10 000 — Start team from Kherson with 154,92 points;
4th place — Uran team from Chernihiv, 157,36 points;
5th place — Space Talents team from Lviv, no points because of rescue system fail;
6th place — Kharkov Rocket Model team from Kharkov, that couldn’t make it to the launch due to technical reasons.
The Planet team from Nizhyn also won a prize for the best presentation.
The Impulse team, who won the challenge, will take part in an international rocketry challenge in London.
These competitions are not the first S2P class rocketry competitions, organized by Noosphere.
These kinds of competitions are widely popular in the USA. For the first time in the history of independent Ukraine, Noosphere has organized an S2P rocketry challenge as a part of the FAI World Championship for Space Models. The event took place in Lviv on August 21-28.
Ukraine rocketry challenge 2019 rules will be announced soon. In order to promote creative thinking among participants, rules will be changed next year according to international rules.
We are proud to make another step toward stirring interest in space and rocketry among young Ukrainians! The more young engineers we have now, the more development we’ll have for the Ukrainian aerospace community later.