Wallops Rocketry Academy for Teachers and Students

19 June 2017

Michelle Hymowitz spent a week at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility learning about rocketry, building and launching model rockets, and watching an actual Sounding Rocket launch.

Conference-style classroom where presentations and demos occurred
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Left: Jeremy Barlow, science teacher
Right: Linda Sherman, WRATS coordinator
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Berit Bland, Master Rocketeer (rocket building instructor)
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Watching Security Protocols for "working" on NASA Wallops campus
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Typical Sounding Rocket performance chart based on weight and time
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Phil Eberspeaker, resident rocket builder and physicist. He explained important considerations for rocket design.
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Earth's magnetic field - in every Astronomy textbook
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Mrs. Hymowitz, building her rocket (left); Bill Lawrence, science teacher (far right)
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Science teachers Chris Foust, left, and Bo Lowery, right, building their rockets.
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Science teacher Debra Edwards, left, and math teacher Laura Yannarella, right, building their rockets.
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Bill Lawrence and Heather Relden-Moore (science teacher) building their rockets.
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Science teachers Nick Horianopoulos, left, and Kal Dardir, right, building their rockets.
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Jim Lewis, left, and Jeremy Barlow, right, building their rockets.
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Teacher Jeremy Gosnell building his rocket.
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Science teacher Larry Eberly building his rocket.
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Michelle Hymowitz and NASA Wallops employee measuring where to cut the body of the rocket off.
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Science teachers William Burroughs, left, and and David Knauth, right, building their rockets.
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David Knauth, Taylah Hawks, and Dawn Wetmore (left to right) building their rockets.
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All of the teachers working on their rockets.
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Linda Sherman telling us the schedule for the rest of the day.
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Laura Yannarella cutting out her rocket fins.
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Laura Yannarella and Berit Bland (standing)
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Jeremy Gosnell gluing his fins to his rocket.
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Kal gluing his fins to his rocket.
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Dawn Wetmore gluing her fins to her rocket.
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Michelle Hymowitz, very satisfied with her three fins glued to her rocket.
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Jeremy Barlow, very satisfied with the straightness of his fins.
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NASA Wallops Machine Shop manager leading our tour.
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This picture gives you an idea of how high the ceilings are in this facility to be able to handle testing the sounding rocket shells.
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Students working on the ROCK-ON launch program.
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Actual Sounding Rocket shells launched back in the 1990's.
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Orbital ATK is the company that sponsors most of the rocketry building and testing at the Wallops facility.
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0026
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Moment of Inertia machine for rockets.
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They spin the rocket to find its Moment of Inertia.
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Jeremy, Michelle, and Jim listening as the Facility Coordinator talked about the Moment of Intertia machine.
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Whole class listening to the Facility Coordinator.
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Unused rocket bolts.
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View from stairs leading to a small upper level.
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Rocket Skin attached to a table...
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...with some end caps on a storage rack.
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One guy was on the floor working on a specific rocket shell.
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Rocket skin on a rolling cart, and yellow hard hats on the wall.
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Several different views of the machine...
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...that measures the balance of the rocket skin and parts.
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Large crane hanging down from t he ceiling to move heavy objects.
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Warning sign.
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Berit Bland up the stairs to take a picture...
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... of all of us on the ground.
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Rocket part made by the KEEN company.
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Guy working on a rocket payload.
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Different views of the shaker machine...
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...that tests a rocket's ability to handle turbulence.
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Different views of a rocket skin...
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...strapped to a table.
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Two guys working on a rocket payload
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Yellow hard hats
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Protective goggles for the ROCK-ON students
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Computer connections
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One group's payload stacked on top of another
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The guy in the black jacket runs the entire ROCK-ON student program at Wallops.
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Different ROCK-ON student groups...
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...at their work stations...
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...putting together their payloads.
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Close-up view of one ROCK-ON student group's payload.
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The plastic box is for mementos -- small items for the students to include; the students can later say that those items went up in the rocket.
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Dawn Wetmore asking one group about their experiment.
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A group of students from Hawaii...
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...talking about their experiment...
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...to a group of WRATS teachers.
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The whole room where the ROCK-ON program took place.
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The ROCK-ON program leader is stacking payloads together...
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...for the upcoming launch.
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William Burrougs looks at his full-body rocket.
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Full classroom view of rocket-building work area.
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Chris Foust checking his rocket fins.
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Bill Lawrence and heather Moore working on their rockets.
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This building houses the Wallops cafeteria.
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Dorms on Wallops campus where many teachers stayed at night.
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