It was the second day of the launch and the vendors were out of the motor I was looking for but luckily Bart, a fellow club member, had one and I was ready to get set up.  “That’s a nice looking rocket you’ve got there” he commented.  “My wife says I probably spend more time sanding and painting than anyone else” I replied.  The BSD design, along with the cut vinyl decals does make for a nice looking rocket, but it’s how it flies that makes it a good rocket, right?

Since this was the maiden flight, it took a bit of fiddling to get the altimeter and ejection charges set up properly.  Then building the motor took a bit more time and when it was finally ready to fly it was getting late in the afternoon.  As I took the rocket to check-in several other people commented on what a nice looking rocket it was.  Now, with every comment I would cringe, it was almost like a kiss of death.  I was more concerned about how it would fly, and all that attention on how the rocket looked seemed like a bad omen.

On the pad I fumbled through the setup: altimeter on, insert igniter, attach the power clips... now check the igniter one more time... is it pushed up against the grain wall?  Everything seem OK so here we go.

The count down was given: 3...2...1...........nothing.  Then smoke but no thrust, more smoke but still no ignition.  Then POP!  The ejection charge when off blowing the upper part of the rocket off then the thrust grains lit shooting flames forward and aft leaving the rocket in flames on the ground and starting a rather large ground fire.  “I’m sorry to see that, that was a nice looking rocket” someone said. “Yea, nice looking rocket,” I thought to myself.

After evaluating what I had done and the sequence of events it’s clear now that I must have slid the igniter up against the delay grain when I checked it.  This caused the delay grain to light but not the thrust grains.  It was the tracking smoke we saw as it sat on the pad and it was only after the ejection charge when off that the thrust grains lit causing the CATO.  Well,  you live and you learn!  I used to say of the Jones boys “We don’t build no ugly rockets”, but now I’m not so sure that’s always a good thing.