One of the main reasons we get such large turn outs and there is such interest in rocketry in our part of the world is because of the continual massive effort put in to promoting our hobby by the current QRS president Ari Piirainen.  In order to recognise Ari for all his hard work, he was officially made a life member of QRS with the presentation of a plaque at this launch just before he was set to launch his M powered rocket in to the heavens.

Ari Holding His Life Membership Plaque Aloft

There were many rockets sent skyward throughout the day, providing great entertainment for the gathered public.  Amongst them were an L1 certification flight and Leigh's L2 certification flight, both successfull.

 Leigh's L2 Certification Flight

The highlight for the crowd was the launch of two M powered rockets, Ari and Simon's flights were great to watch and the first time two M's had been launched on the same day at a QRS launch.

 Ari's Rocket on an M1297W

 Simon's Rocket on a M1780T

With all of the crowd interaction and activity it was a quiet day for me personally with just one flight of my PML Mystic on a G53-7J motor, but it was another great flight from this rocket.

 My PML Mystic on a G53-7J

 Another great QRS public launch has come and gone but what a successfull one it was!  Click here for the full set of photos and check out a brief video of some of the flights below. 

See you all at the April members launch!

- The Ausrockets Team.

January 30th saw QRS hold its first launch of 2011 and we were joined by a large contingent of attendees from the linux.conf.au (http://lca2011.linux.org.au/) that was recently held in the Queensland state capital city of Brisbane.  It was a pleasure to meet BDale Garbee, Keith Packard and all the other conference goers that joined us for our launch and launched a bunch of rockets they had been working on during the conference to highlight the usage of the OpenRocket (http://openrocket.sourceforge.net/) software. 

There were a number of great launches on the day including Shirley's successful L1 and L2 certification flights and L1 Certifications for Nic and Mark.  Congratulations to all of you!

I personally launched both my PML Mystic on a G76-7G and PML Sudden rush on an I154J - the were both great flights.

Check out the video below to see a selection of the flights from the day. 

Unfortunately the Ausrockets team won't be able to make the February launch, but we will be back for the March launch and look forward to bringing you all the action from the first public launch of 2011.

- The Ausrockets Team.

Personally I launched my Callisto on a G64 and my new PML Mystic had it's second flight, taking the power up a notch on a H220.  Both flights were successful although the Mystic sent myself and most of the Ausrockets team on an hour long search through four to six foot high corn in the infamous QRS corn field.  Luckily the rocket was eventually found despite the rain and mud!

Check out the video and photos of the launch below or see the full collection of photos from the event, including higher resolution versions by clicking here.

We look forward to seeing everyone at the final QRS launch of 2010 next month!

- The Ausrockets team.

It was certainly a day of firsts.  Starting with a live national television cross to our site for a few launches by Channel Nine's "Today Show".  If you didn't get to see it, you can see a recording of the cross below.

Channel Nine News also showed up to shoot a story for the news later in the day but unfortunately the footage did not make it to air on the nightly news. 

In amongst the media frenzy we also managed to launch 94 rockets - a high for the club.  The breakdown was as follows:

A 8
B 4
C 25
D 7
E 13
F 8
G 17
H 6
I 4
J 2

One of those G motors was the maiden launch of our new PML Mystic rocket on a G76-7G - a great flight for it's first flight and it returned perfectly ready to fly again!  Hopefully next launch we will have some photos of it in action!

Another first on the day was the first QRS launch that saw the use of a Telemetrum GPS / Altimeter combination in a great high flight - it would be great to see more of this in the future.

Unfortunately there was one other first, it seems newly installed power lines over our site have claimed their first victim with one rocket (an L1 attempt as well) getting hung up on them, but with luck it will come down and eventually be recovered.

As a special note, following on from a few incidents of lost rockets, QRS has decided to get serious about rocket tracking equipment.

Ok, so that was actually the satellite link for the live TV broadcast, but we did try to convince Channel Nine to leave it with us; unfortunately they declined.

It turned out to be a fantastic day of both weather and launches and you can see some highlights of the flights in the video below.

We look forward to next year's October Skies event with baited breath!

- The Ausrockets Team.

The hightlight of the day was without doubt the first M size motor launched at a QRS launch.  A big thanks to Dave (Scoop) for heading over from Perth to put on a great show for us.

There was also a fantastic drag race between two smaller Thor rockets (Dave and Mike's) on the same K motor.

Last launch of the day was the only high power non-thor launch of the day - Wayne's Mongoose.

Whilst the day didn't turn out to be what was expected due to weather, some amazing launches were made and gave those regular rocketry enthusiasts a chance to catch up with everyone and meet some people in the flesh that we have only known via online contact.

Thanks to everyone who did come along given the weather conditions and we look forward to being at the recheduled event on Sunday 17th of October.

- The AusRockets Team.

October will see our first promoted interstate event. Named after one of the greatest rocketry movies of all time, October Skies 2010 will be the first (and smallest) of many annual events 

Come and join rocketry enthusiasts from all over Australia at QRS's maiden October Skies Launch for a great day of special launches!

Keep an eye on http://www.qldrocketry.com/ for further information.

There were some great flights on the day, including a launch of a tribrid rocket, another MetalStorm launch and Bruce attaining his L2 certification on a "Matrix" flying on a J500G motor - congratulations Bruce!  I took the opportunity to fly some of my smaller rockets that hadn't seen air time recently, launching my Deuces Wild, Lil Hustler and my always reliable Callisto.

All up there were 80 recorded launches for the day consisting of 

A: 5
B: 6
C: 28
D: 9
E: 6
F: 7
G: 8
H: 4
I: 2
J: 4
K: 1

Check out the video and photos below.  Also, as always, many more photos are available here.

Clearly, another fantastic launch day with QRS!

- The Ausrockets Team.