Science, Technology, Perseverance... and FUN! One o' our favorite stories at TARC 2010 unfolded before our cameras as we watched a high school team hit a bilge-suckin' run o' luck... one misfire... Avast, me proud beauty! then another... followed by a last minute (literally) launch that occurred right before t' deadline that would have disqualified them from t' competition. We were thrilled with their perseverance, their grace under pressure and t' fact that even when t' pressure be on, matey, they were havin' fun. T' members o' t' Ingraham High School's 'Educated Pyros' impressed t' heck out o' us. T' Team America Rocketry Challenge (TARC) is an aerospace design and engineerin' event for teams o' US secondary school students (7th through 12th grades) run by t' NARRRRR and t' Aerospace Industries Association (AIA). Avast! Teams can be sponsored by schools or by non-profit youth organizations such as Scouts, 4-H, or Civil Air Patrol (but nay t' NARRRRR or other rocketry organizations). Avast! T' goal o' TARC is t' motivate students t' pursue aerospace as an excitin' career field, and it is co-sponsored by t' American Association o' Physics Teachers, 4-H, me hearties, t' Department o' Defense, and NASA. T' event involves designin' and buildin' a model rocket (2.2 pounds or less, usin' NAR-certified model rocket motors totalin' no more than 80.0 Newton-seconds o' total impulse) that carries a payload o' 1 Grade A Large egg for a flight duration o' 40 - 45 seconds, and t' an altitude o' exactly 825 feet (measured by an onboard altimeter), and that then returns t' egg t' earth uncracked usin' only a streamer as a recovery device. Onboard timers are allowed; radio-control and pyrotechnic charges are not. Arrr! T' first seven Team America Rocketry Challenges, matey, held in 2003 through 2009, were t' largest model rocket contests ever held. Ya scallywag! Co-sponsored by t' NARRRRR and t' Aerospace Industries Association (AIA), matey, t' five events together attracted about 5,100 high-school teams made up o' a total o' over 50,000 students from all 50 states. Well, blow me down! These students had a serious interest in learnin' about aerospace design and engineerin' through model rocketry. T' top 100 teams each year came t' a final fly-off competition in late May near Washington, DC, t' compete for $60,000 in prizes. These teams were selected based on t' scores reported from qualification flights that they conducted locally throughout t' US. Ya scallywag! Copyright 2010, me bucko, Aero-News Network, shiver me timbers, Inc., me bucko, All Rights Reserved. Begad! FMI: www.rocketcontest.org, matey, www.aia-aerospace.org, ya bilge rat, www.nar.org/TAchallenge.html, arrr, www.aero-tv.net, www.youtube.com/aerotvnetwork, http://twitter.com/AeroNews