Will it Last?

 The Thrifty Rocketeer steals today's topic from the headlines...

A while back, I commented on the move to replace Estes rubber shock cords with Kevlar strings and such.  And I found another blog entry about How to Rescue from a Tree.

Well, the topic has come up with a vengeance once again.

Two months or more ago, a fellow rocketeer decided to launch a high-power rocket on a windy day at our launch field.  As you might guess, the steady winds aloft made all rockets launched that day drift.  But this one went further than the others, into the trees.

Now, it's bad enough to get your rocket stuck in a tree, but consider that this was a multi-stage high power rocket that had a drog chute, a nosecone, a midsection, and a body tube that contained a casing of high quality.  And all four parts were connected by a sturdy harness strap.

As a result, the top of the chute is snagged in the top of the tallest tree that bounds the field, and dangles the rest of the 30-40 foot length down to the mid-section of the tree.  Note that I did NOT say to the ground, nor even to the base of the tree.  The tree grows in a ravine, and so, is easily 50-100 feet tall, having grown there since the early 1970s, some 50 years ago.

Now, if the shock cord had been rubber, it probably would have deteriorated by now, and the rocket parts fallen to the ground.  That has been the pattern with two other rockets that drifted there more than 2 years ago. They were recovered within 2 months, on the ground.

But this one not only has been hanging, but has been hidden by fall leaves, at least until this week.

So the problem becomes one of trying to remove the rocket by the most efficient and safest means.

Which option would you try?

  1. Use a drone to try to lift the rocket out of the tree.
  2. Try climbing the tree to dislodge the rocket
  3. Use a reach pole to try to trim the tree or reach the rocket.
  4. Use a drone to just pull the chute free and let gravity work.
  5. Hire a utility linesman to climb and free the rocket
  6. Wait for it to rot and come down on its own
  7. Cut your losses and forget about it.


Comments

  1. Frankie DJanuary 8, 2022 at 9:23 AM

    There is a club in Maine that requires fliers to hire a tree person to retrieve your rocket if it is stuck in a tree. They have a policy of no rocket left behind. I think the tree person charges around $100. Not a bad deal when you think about how much money you may have invested in a rocket between the electronics, casing and other parts. Not to mention the countless hours of work you put into the rocket. In Boy Scouts we were taught to always carry an emergency dime to make a phone call. I guess in this case, carry an emergency C note.

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