Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium Supports Waterloo Indigenous Student Team in Rocketry Competition

A team of five Indigenous students from the University of Waterloo participated in the First Nations Launch, an annual high-power rocket competition sponsored by NASA’s Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium (WSGC), designed to provide a unique aerospace learning experience.

It was the team’s first time taking part in the competition which involved designing, building and launching a high-powered model rocket carrying cargo to an apogee of 2000 feet. Months of hard work and invaluable support culminated in an epic — and windy — weekend in Kenosha, Wisconsin that everyone agrees, was a blast.

“We didn’t know what to expect going in,” says Matthieu Lavallee, a second-year chemical engineering student and Algonquin Anishinaabe member of the Wolf Lake First Nation in Québec.

“Each step was a massive learning curve which was great. There were lots of technical parameters we had to meet such as payload size and deployment timing, we also had some testing challenges as it isn’t possible to launch a high-powered rocket in Canada without proper authorization. But we had tons of support and nothing felt impossible.”

Read the full article on UWaterloo.ca

Author Credit: Charlotte Danby

Image Credit: University of Waterloo

Original Post Date: June 24, 2024