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Insurance and Section Renewal
We have completed the process of renewing our insurance policy through our agent Bob Blomster at JA Price Agency. The new policy has the same provisions and takes effect at the moment that the previous year policy expires, on April 5.
Bob's office is making up section and site owner insurance certificates to get out the door by the end of this week, for those sections that had their renewal packets at NAR HQ by Friday, March 13. NAR HQ will sending out section charter certificates to those sections this week as well. The next batch of renewals will be processed on April 1, covering all section renewals received at NAR HQ by March 31. |
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NAR Section Safety Grant Program
The NAR Board has just approved a new program of cash grants of up to $250 to NAR sections for the purpose of purchasing equipment needed to enhance range safety at their flying fields. This document describing this program is posted on the NAR website.
Applications from sections for equipment grants under this new program will not be accepted by NAR Safety Committee Chairman Andy Eng until May 1, so until then meet within your section to develop the shopping list of the stuff you need to make your flying range safer. See the program description for the items that we suggest. |
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U.S. International Spacemodeling Team Selection
A flyoff competition will be held the first weekend of NARAM-51 to select the members of the NAR team that will represent the U.S.A. at the 2010 FAI World Spacemodeling Championships (WSMC). This competition will be held near Belgrade, Serbia in August 2010. John Langford is the NAR volunteer who manages this program.
For more information on FAI (international) flying and the full text of the procedures for the flyoff, visit the Yahoo Group and the section of the NAR website for U.S. FAI fliers. |
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Announce Your Rocket Launch
The NAR maintains an online calendar called "Launch Windows" that lists section-sponsored competition and sport launches across the U.S., by state. NAR volunteer Bruce Canino posts updates here regularly, based on what sections send him using the online submission form found on the NAR website. Be sure to keep Launch Windows up-to-date by sending in announcements of all your regular scheduled launches. |
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Reporting
Rocket Engine Malfunctions
Even though the rocket engines that we use are carefully safety-tested by the manufacturer and by the NAR Standards & Testing Committee, a small percentage (typically less than one-half of one percent) have some form of malfunction when fired. It is important that both the manufacturer and the NAR get feedback that this has occurred, with details of the circumstances and the label information from the engine.
The report to the NAR is done by using the "Malfunctioning Engine Statistical Survey (MESS) report form online. Please fill one of these out every time you have a flight failure of an NAR-certified hobby rocket motor. In addition, you need to communicate directly to the manufacturer in order to get any warrantied replacement. | |
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Message from the NAR President
Greetings!
Your NAR has had a memorable year so far in our dealings with the Federal agencies who are involved in regulating our hobby. Earlier this month we and TRA jointly achieved a huge Federal Court victory in our expensive 9-year legal battle against the BATFE's "arbitrary and capricious" attempts (the Judge's words) to regulate our possession and use of ammonium perchlorate composite propellant. See the joint NAR-TRA statement on exactly where we stand following this Court decision. And we achieved a reasonable negotiated compromise with another Federal Agency, the FAA, which issued new Federal Aviation Regulations on rocketry that took effect in February. The FAA finally gave our hobby something that we in the NAR had been working with them for 15 years to achieve, an increase from 1 pound to 3.3 pounds in the allowable size of model rockets not subject to FAA prior notification or approval. Both of these regulatory successes were the result of extended, technically-rigorous efforts by a succession of NAR leaders acting on your behalf and with your support.
Our battle to be free of the BATFE's grip is not yet completely over, so please be patient until it is. We will get the word out to you immediately as events unfold and we have definitive, accurate information to pass along. The BATFE regulations are still in effect for a little while longer, and we must comply until they are not. Even once the BATFE regulations and licensing requirements are gone, we still have a duty to be responsible, safe, self-regulating users of high-power rocket motors. NFPA Code 1127 remains in effect as our guidance, and it requires both formal user certification (i.e from NAR or TRA) to possess or use these motors, and use of magazines to store them, even though BATFE licenses and inspections will not be involved. Your local authorities may have requirements for storage as well. Just because BATFE is out of our lives does not mean that "anything goes". If we do not self-regulate carefully, or if we are intemperate in language or behavior toward BATFE and its employees we could be faced with another regulatory battle.
A big "thank you" to Al Gloer and the CATO section for the excellent NAR Convention (NARCON 2009) that they hosted in Wethersfield, CT last weekend. It was good to have a NAR national event back in New England, and they did a fine job running it. The NAR Board of Trustees held its semiannual meeting at NARCON, and you can expect to see the full Board meeting minutes posted on the NAR website within 30 days. Our focus in this meeting was taking immediate action to address feedback from the online survey of NAR members that 1,211 of you responded to. See the description below of one of the new programs we approved, the "Section Safety Grant Program".
I hope you enjoyed the March-April issue of the NAR "Sport Rocketry" magazine. Editor Tom Beach has done a great job in doing there what we are doing across all the NAR programs -- increasing emphasis on high-power rocketry to reflect our members' interests, in equal balance with our long-standing role in model rocketry. Please keep supporting Tom by sending him good articles!
Be safe, have fun, and pay forward.
Trip Barber, NAR 4322
NAR President |
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NAR National Sport Launch (NSL 2009)
The National Association of Rocketry's annual National Sport Launch (NSL) will be held at Richard Bong state recreation area in southeastern Wisconsin on May 23rd- 25th, 2009. Memorial Day weekend. The event website can be found at www.nsl2009.org and registration is open. The official hotel is the Country Inns and Suites. We have a block of rooms at this hotel that will be held for our guests until April 28th. We have also reserved a group camping site at the park that can accommodate as many as 30 people or so.
One of the best reasons to attend NSL will be the many and varied rocketry vendors in attendance. Vendors who are not able to attend are also sending in items to be raffled or given away in registration packets. Keep an eye on the NSL website as more vendors add their names.
NSL 2009 will also feature three special events. The L-1 build and fly event will pit six teams of four persons each to build a high power rocket in as short a time as possible, prep it for flight and then compete in a predicted duration contest to see who wins. This is by invite only due to the practicalities involved in hosting it. The secret payload duration event will occur all three days of the launch. The payload is small enough to fit in most mid power rockets and will be made available at a flyers meeting on Saturday morning of the event. Everyone is encouraged to participate. The Saturn mass launch event will be held on Monday. Any Saturn model is welcome and each will be launched separately to give each modeler their own spotlight.
We will have a range layout of more than 44 pads thanks to the assistance of our friends at Tripoli Wisconsin Association and Tripoli Quad Cities. There will be pads large enough to handle 100 lb. rockets with ease. We also offer hybrid support for U/C type hybrid motors.
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NAR Annual Meet (NARAM-51)
Registration for the National Association of Rocketry's Annual Meet, NARAM-51, is now open through the event website www.naram.org. NARAM-51 will be held near Johnstown, Pennsylvania, from Saturday, August 8, through Friday, August 14, 2009 You may register online with fees payable through PayPal, or download a PDF form the site to mail in your registration. Beginning with the FAI U.S. team selection fly offs starting on Saturday morning, this year's NARAM schedule is packed full of activities for everyone; you especially won't want to miss the Rockets Beyond Strange presentation before heading out for some extended flying time at the night launch, where we will find out who should be certified to fly with the experts at Area 51 East. Sunday's activities will include a Manufacturer's Demo and a special event, the "Saturn Showcase", to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing, sponsored by Sirius Rocketry. During the day, Monday through Friday, competitors will vie for top dog in 10 NAR events, while the evening activities will continue at the host hotel, including the annual NAR auction and the R&D presentations. So make your plans to attend, register, and bring lots of rockets. | |
Team America Rocketry Challenge
(TARC 2009) Flight Deadline
This year's Team America Rocketry Challenge (TARC) national rocketry competition for teams of 7th-12th grade students is reaching its "qualification deadline" on April 6. This is the date by which the teams that want to be one of the 100 invited to compete in the national Finals on May 16 have to conduct an official qualification flight attempt and submit the results of their flight to TARC headquarters. This qualification flight must be conducted in front of an NAR Senior (age 21 or older) member, and that NAR member must sign their score report after observing that they followed all the TARC flight rules, recording their altimeter altitude and their flight duration, and verifying that the egg payload is unbroken.
If you are asked by a team to be their flight observer, or if your section receives a request from a team to fly with you or use your launch site, please try to say "yes" if at all possible. TARC is the NAR's premier "paying forward" outreach program to encourage young people to pick aerospace as a career field and rocketry as a hobby. For more information about TARC see the NAR TARC webpage or the official TARC website. | |
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