the digital nest

Last Saturday, some students from Hillcrest Middle School including myself went to Challenger Space Center to participate in a weekend event called “Rocket Day”. We got to make our very own model rocket and even launch them in mid-air.  We also did a simulated Mars mission. There were two teams in the mission, The Mission control and The Spaceship crew. The storyline of the mission was that the mission control had been stuck on Mars for 2 years and they tried to contact any support from any spaceships. The Mission control had finally received a message from a spaceship that was heading straight to Mars to come get them and fly them back to Earth.

If you were on the mission control team, you had to contact the spaceship crew about how to assemble probes, do health checks, etc. If you were on the spaceship crew, you had to listen to what the mission control says in order to save them. You also had to launch a probe to either one of Mars moons, Phobos or Deimos. At the end of the mission, the spaceship crew was able to save the mission control. At the end of the day, I’d say it was pretty fun and a great learning experience. I would highly recommend attending the next time it is offered. See Mr. Herold for more details.

The mission control room. Picture Credits: Mr Herold.

A picture of my model rocket launching. Picture credits: Mr. Herold