Rockets at Repton

The annual “Repton Challenge” for preparatory schools took place on Sunday, October 3rd, the participants being Birchfield, Foremarke Hall, Grace Dieu, St Anselm’s, St Hugh’s and Yarlet. This year’s Challenge centred round an imagined rescue mission of stranded astronauts. Teams were given an initial mission briefing by Repton’s Head of Physics Sam Mitchell, then split into two sub-teams to tackle the first phase of their experimental work. One group worked in Pears School to fire projectiles and determine the best angle of elevation to maximise their range, the remainder investigated exactly which combination of water loading and blu-tac ballast would give the most successful water rocket launch.



Groups re-assembled in the ICT centre and were provided with a template PowerPoint presentation, within which they were required to explain the details of their experiments and their design. After lunch in boarding houses, the teams reconvened to complete their mission presentations and tinker with rocket designs, combining their understanding of ideal elevation angle with how to achieve maximum thrust.

Head of Physics Sam Mitchell takes up the story of what happened at the all-important launches. “There were two distinct competitions”, he comments, “firstly a simple maximum distance event, then one aimed at landing the rocket as close as possible to the stranded astronauts”. Despite technical hitches on the launch-pad, St Hugh’s posted an early lead as “longest launchers”, with an incredible 82.8 metres in the distance section. After an eventful series of “accuracy” launches, however, during which one team fired their rocket over a wall, and another sent theirs wildly onto the public highway, it was Yarlet School who emerged the overall victors, with St Hugh’s second and Foremarke Hall third.



Chief rocket technician Bill Snider (who masterminded all the equipment used in the Challenge) demonstrated a chemical rocket of the type received by the winning teams, which shot to an impressive altitude of over 200 metres, before Repton Headmaster Robert Holroyd presented the prizes. All teams present, according to Sam Mitchell, displayed “great reserves of enthusiasm in heinous weather conditions”, showing unquenchable inventiveness and enterprise on one of the wettest October Sundays in living memory.