A sleek carbon fiber rocket built by two residents of Dairy Flat, Albany, Joel Schiff & Martin Aspell, was launched from the New Zealand Rocketry Association site at Taupiri near Huntly, on 20th February 2011. It took off from a specially built tower built to accommodate their 98mm diameter, 2.6m long rocket. The rocket took off with a great roar and the motor seemed to burn forever (actually 13 seconds) which helped keep the rocket in view.
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After 43 seconds, the rocket had coasted to its maximum altitude (apogee) of 10,275m (33,701ft) above ground level, setting a new New Zealand altitude record. Whilst descending by parachute, a tracking device in the nose cone using the GSM cellular network stopped communicating at an altitude of 5,300m.
After a few frantic calculations, the recovery site was reduced to one particular farm 4.7 km away and much of it was searched on the day without success. It was eventually found by the farmer himself two days later very near to where we had been searching! There was no damage at all to the rocket, although the paint work on the edges of the fins got a bit frazzled from going mach 1.5 (one-and-a-half times the speed of sound).
A video of the flight can be viewed at: http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=hqm26ZiaM-Y&vq=large
Joel Schiff