Those who attended the CATO launch on Super Bowl Sunday were rewarded with very calm winds and moderate temperatures. The biggest problem of the day was keeping your butt off the icy field! Walking around had to be done with caution to avoid a spill. A smaller than normal group turned out for this event; the launch setup was scaled back to one rack of Estes pads and two mid/high power pads. Because of the hard ice surface on the field, a number of rockets came back with damaged or broken fins despite an otherwise normal landing. Despite the icy conditions, overall it was great day for flying!

 
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	Sean Hogan prepares a motor for his "Green Thing" rocket.		John Poulin prepares his Saturn 4 rocket for launch.
	Paul Welling does a final check on his "Barracuda" rocket.		Joe Roberts' Estes Cobra (clone) awaits liftoff.
	The Delarby Brothers perform last minute inspections of their rockets.		The smallest rocket launched today was Jay Calvert's "Nano Geek Pencil". Recovery was headfirst into the ice!
	Jay Calvert displays his "ready for launch" Great Pumpkin (stretched PML Ariel). On board are 15 3-Musketeers bars (or were they Snickers)? The kids didn't care, most bars were quickly recovered on the field!		Jay Calvert's "Great Pumpkin" heads skyward on a column of black smoke from an I154J motor.
	Joe Roberts' scratchbuilt 3 inch "Sky Hook" (a classic Estes model) awaits liftoff on its maiden voyage.		The "business end" of Russ Taragon's Phantom 4000. This rocket had an excellent flight, all 5 "D" motors fired perfectly!
	Paul Welling makes final adjustments to his I161 powered "Mini Mag".		Paul has another great flight on his "Mini Mag"!
	Charlie Loveday shows CATO members what he's working on for his Level 2 cert. Looking like a very stretched (and very large) Estes Sprite, this should be a spectacular flight to see!		Some late day visitors joined us for a close up look at what was going on all day...

LAUNCH HIGHLIGHTS:

Today's launch had 16 registered flyers and a total of 70 flights. Joe Roberts had the most flights (11), followed by John Poulin who had 9 flights. Jay Calvert burned the most propellant (691 Newton seconds), edging out Paul Welling at 619 Newton seconds. Collectively we burned a total of 3373 Newton seconds, equal to a mid "L" motor.

Clusters: Russ Taragan flew his Phantom 4000 on a cluster of 5 D12-3 black powder motors, all ignited and the flight was perfect! Joe Roberts flew his Estes Cobra (clone) on 3 A8-3 motors. Jay Calvert flew his "Twisted Mamas" rocket twice on mixed AP motors.

Classic Kits: Several flyers had classic kits in the air today. John Poulin flew his Estes Sprint and Estes Javelin several times. Ryan Andrews had the ever popular "Big Bertha" airborne on a C6-3. Joe Roberts flew his 1972 Estes Spaceman on a very conservative A8-3.

Helicopters / Gliders: George Boulas had some very impressive Helicopter flights with his High Rotor I rocket (this rocket will be a serious contender in future helicopter duration contests!). Unfortunately, the second flight of High Rotor I ended in a crash when the rotors failed to deploy. The result was a punched in nose, rendering the rocket "done for the day". Ryan Andrews, Bob Andrews and Joe Roberts flew Estes Skywinders with nice results. Jay Calvert also flew his "Crusader Swing Wing". Joe Roberts daringly flew his Estes Condor (a white rocket with two white gliders with the field covered with ice and snow!).

Notable Flights: Sean Hogan had two more awesome flights with his "Green Thing". Joe Roberts and John Poulin had an Estes Corkscrew drag race... both rockets not only flew nearly identically, they landed within 30 feet of each other! Jay Calvert flew rockets with the largest size extremity, from the minute "Nano Geek Pencil" on 1/8 A power to the "Great Pumpkin" (stretched PML Ariel) on I154J power). Jay also made another successful "candy drop" with the Great Pumpkin. The Delarby brothers (Marc, Phillip and Andrew) flew a total of 11 flights, with Marc and Phillip making their maiden voyages on two birds. Bob Andrews had some nice flights with 3 of his LOC rockets. Russ Taragan flew has "Mach Buster" on F101 power; this rocket bolted out of sight almost instantaneously! Unfortunately, the rocket's whereabouts are now unknown...

Motor CATOs: None (not even an Estes "D"!). Several rockets had failed recovery deployments; not sure if this was due to a motor failure or other malfunction.

MOTOR STATS: