Rocket engines are going to be ignited in the Red Deer Lake area this spring.
Rocket engines are going to be ignited in the Red Deer Lake area this spring.
A group of students from the University of Calgary will be visiting Rothney Observatory Area once per week beginning in early April until mid-June, testing a rocket engine they've built for an international competition.
The fourth-year undergraduate engineering students are being supervised by Dr. Craig Johansen, associate professor in the Schulich School of Engineering at the U of C, as they prepare to enter their hybrid rocket in Space Port America's Intercollegiate Rocket Engineering Competition (IREC) June 20 – 24.
The IREC competition sees upward of 50 schools come together with their rockets, where they are challenged to hit certain altitudes and carry payloads, and receive scores for how they perform, said Johansen.
They're using Rothney Observatory as a testing ground to ensure their engines are working according to their calculations, he said.
“We're going to test the rocket's thrust,” said Johansen. “They're going to have the rocket basically bolted down to a test stand so it can't move and they're going to fire it, and they're going to use a load cell to measure thrust during the burn.”
Each test will last about six to eight seconds, he said, so the noise disturbance should be kept to a minimum for neighbours.
Testing will take place once per week, with only one test happening on each day. All tests will take place between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., he said.
Johansen said they estimate the sound level will be about 100 decibels for residents within one to two kilometres from Rothney Observatory.
Rothney was chosen because it's a U of C site, and for its relatively remote location, he said.
He said they're looking forward to competition time, and as testing occurs the excitement will grow.
“Everyone around here is really excited,” said Johansen. “There's not a lot of aerospace stuff happening in Alberta, so this is definitely a big thing for us and everyone that's in the project is really into aerospace itself, so we're very excited about that.”
