Rocket Day

For the past 3 months Gabe has been focused on his rocket project in his Honors Science class since it is a significant portion of his grade.  It is a super bottle rocket.  They were all about 5 feet long with fins, an altimeter, and even a parachute to guide it down safely.  He was on the parachute deployment team, so he focused on the parachute.  We heard about it nearly daily for the past few weeks, although he has been talking mostly with Jeff about it lately.  This weekend all the teams set off their rockets.  It was very fun, about half the time the parachute didn't work and the rocket would come crashing back to earth like an enormous lawn dart, then crumple upon impact.  But every once in a while, one would function properly with a great parachute deployment and come floating back to earth.  Gabe's teams first attempt was okay, the rocket went up, but the parachute came out way too early, and ripped on the way up, so it didn't really gently fall down.  It was a little crumpled, but not nearly as bad as many others.  His second attempt was perfect.  The rocked just shot up really high, then just as it was starting to fall, the parachute flew out, and it gently glided back to earth.  It took a while to find it because the wind caught it and it landed on the roof of the buildings.  But once they found it, they were thrilled!  It went 352 feet into the air, and set a new school record.  He was very happy about the parachute, and the height, their rocket did very well.