Being addicted to experimenting, I greatly admire the “fly often, fail often, test often” spirit of the University of Minnesota Rocket Team. On Thursday these student rocketeers updated us engineering and other U Mn alums on their latest exploits, including a win and Overall Award in the 30k bracket of the Spaceport America Cup 2021.

Having grown up during the Space Race and celebrated my golden 16^th birthday the day Apollo 11 launched off to put the first man on the Moon, I am keen to see such great leaps in technology for amateur rocketry. It astounds me that a group comprised mainly of undergrad aeronautical engineers can design and build an aircraft reaching 30,000 feet (and much higher if not prohibited by the FAA). That beats my personal-best for rocketry by 29,970 feet or so, ha ha.

“It all looked so easy when you did it on paper — where valves never froze, gyros never drifted, and rocket motors did not blow up in your face.”

Milton W. Rosen, rocket engineer and project manager in the US space program between the end of World War II and the early days of the Apollo Program.

With such great “can do” spirit, willingness to fail, and the high-tech resources of our College of Science and Engineering, the flying Gophers will go far in future, I feel sure.