NCR Club Launch - Mile High Mayhem 5 Day 1

Friday May 4th, 2007

Launch Summary

The greatly anticipated special Spring launch event for NCR. Three days of Rocky Mountain rocketry. However, Mother Nature had different plans. The weather forecast had changed too many times to be predictable and unfortunately the worse weather possible materialized. At least on Friday we got off to a good start. 56 flyers put up a total of 121 flights, including an L1 Cert for Mike Shinn, an L2 Cert for Ian MacDonald and an L3 Cert for Ed Dawson - Congratulations! Other notable flights have to inlcude Sue Crawford's first ever Hot Pink Baby Bertha's boosts, Thing 1 and Thing 2 from Dale and Patty Netherton - a staged cluster of 3 RoadRunner G80's to another RR G80, Bob Messner's Wolverine III reached the Two Mile Club at 11,051', John Bixler's shot of Hotroddicus Supersonicus on an AMW K800 Blue Baboon, Bret Packard's AMW K555 Sparky in his scratch built Whamer, the Frazier's Drag Race on Aerotech I 366's, Jason Chamberlin's Endeavor on the Pro54 K445 and all of the other 110 flights listed below. Flights are listed in a random order as the flight cards have been shuffled and sorted a few times thereby eliminating the correct sequence of flights launched. Motor usage breaks down as follows, with staged flights and clusters credited to the largest motor used - A's=3, B's=14, C's=23, D's=6, E's=12, F's=10, G's=22, H's=10, I's=9, J's=6, K's=3, L's=0 and M's=2. Extra special thanks to Warren Musselman for towing out and setting the range with the invaluable help of Mike Shinn and his wife Rhonda, Brian Keel and Art Hoag. Huge appreciation and thanks to Debi Billings and Sarah for helping out with the Registration and raffle and Incredulous gratitude to everyone that helped tear down and pack the trailer in the rain - and to Mike Crawford for hauling the trailer back to storage. Hero of the Day award to Ed Dawson for seven mud stuck vehicle rescues.

Weather Conditions

Springtime on the prairie turned to twisters and hail, heavy rain, muddy roads, chilling winds from the north and washed out the rest of the weekend. Range was set on Thursday afternoon in glorious sunshine and slight wind. Turned to rain showers and then ugly winds and hail. Friday morning was overcast but with signs of clearing. Winds aloft were in a flux and spinning the compass. Cloud ceiling remained at 15,000 but with large spots of clear sky and Colorado blue. Stayed dry until about 10 PM. Intermittnet showers during the night turned to a constant rain and scattered hail in the early hours of Saturday. The rain never let up and by noon the decision was made to wash out the launch and try again in June.