Our congratulations to Kevin Reilley and Richard Zappulla II who have been selected for NASA's Reduced Gravity Education Flight Program (aka, the Vomit Comet)!

The Georgia Tech Ramblin' Rocketeers, a student-lead, cross-disciplinary engineering team which focuses on the development, fabrication, and testing of a reusable rocket, have been accepted into the NASA University Student Launch Initiative (USLI) 2012-2013 competition.  The USLI competition is a national collegiate NASA-sponsored rocketry competition in which universities design, build, and launch level two high-power rockets with scientific payloads to one mile in altitude.  During the academic year leading up to the April launch in Huntsville, AL, the Ramblin' Rocketeers will have to pass the Preliminary and Critical Design Reviews - as well as a Flight Readiness Review and a Launch Readiness Review before the team will be approved to launch - that will be conducted by Marshall Space Flight Center.  The Ramblin' Rocketeers are a consistently high-ranking team and last year finished in 4th place in the most competitive season to date with over 50 other colleges and universities competing.

In addition to competing in the USLI competition, the Ramblin' Rocketeers have also been selected as the first-ever team to participate in the Reduced Gravity Education Flight Program (RGEFP).  This program allows teams to fly larger-scale experiments on NASA's Vomit Comet; the Ramblin' Rocketeers will be attempting to damp slosh in microgravity using a magnetorheological fluid, a "smart fluid" which changes viscosity in response to a magnetic field.

After their launch, Kevin and Richard will be required to complete a Post-Launch Assessment Review to include conclusions from their science and engineering experiments and the overall flight performance.  The Preliminary Design Review, Critical Design Review and Flight Readiness Review are conducted by a panel of scientists and engineers from NASA, NASA contractors and external partners.

To see Kevin & Richard's science proposal to NASA, click