Impromptu Northwest Philly Launch, Saturday Feb 27 2026

[Joseph Kopena]

With tomorrow's launch at Hallowell Farm canceled, Alice and I are planning on flying some rockets informally in northwest Philly. Everybody's welcome to join us but note it is NOT an official club event and I have no permits, the field is very limited, etc etc etc.. Just some people happening to show up at the same time and the same place to play with some kid toys.

Where

Water Tower Recreation Center

209 E Hartwell Ln, Philadelphia, PA, 19118

(soccer+baseball fields on west side)

There's plenty of street parking all around outside the fields, just pay attention to signage. Note the south side (along Ardleigh) is a steep-ish hill down to the field, though it does have a paved walkway.

When

Tomorrow! Saturday, February 28th. We'll be there at 10:30. I'm envisioning being there till ~1pm or so.

What

This is a low low-power launch. There's a solid 200ft of space clear of any structures and a good 150ft between the perimeter trees. NAR spec permits up to a B motor in that size field. I think you could safely launch a C or even a low flying D and maybe even get your rocket back, but I obviously would never ever not follow the exact letter of the strictest regulation. Use your best judgement.

I'll bring a 5-pad launch rack with standard 1/8in rods, no need to bring ground equipment but feel free if you want.

I'm not bringing any Rocketship Games retail, but let me know if you need anything.

Caveats

Launch site is an out-of-season Philly Rec Dept field and, again, I have no permission, permits, etc., and can't guarantee access. I strongly assume there's nothing scheduled tomorrow but you never know. If there's a problem we'll maybe go to another location a few minutes away or just stand around and talk rockets for a bit and/or go get snacks at the food court half a block down.

Boots strongly recommended, it's gonna be slushy and/or muddy.

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- tjkopena
right here and now

[Philip Stein]

Nice seeing you today.

Hope the kids enjoy the rocket stuff - most of it was donated by the late Bill Sullivan, one of the original members of PARA from when it started.

Take care,

Phil Stein

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[David Haas]

How did the launch go??

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[Joseph Kopena]

As expected Saturday was a great day to fly but a terrible day for launch operations. Blue skies, little wind, but trench-war caliber mud on our little soccer/baseball complex. At one point my left foot got sucked in so deep I couldn't pull it out and had to rock it side-to-side while kicking out an escape path with my right foot. Can't imagine what the farm would have been like.

Despite that we had good turnout, 10 spectators & flyers, 15--20 flights over about two hours. Outrageous range safety officer though, almost as wild as that Hansen guy I keep hearing about. Fortunately the children mostly made good decisions. Alice launched a bunch of favorites with good flights landing nail-bitingly just inside the trees. Rowan and Daisy had spectacular flights with their Athena, Gnome, and Bandit. Elliot had several different kinds of spectacular flights with his 3D printed custom designs but is an early contender for "practical engineer of the year" after improving some stability problems by glopping a fistful of mud into the nose of one. For a bit of further excitement, other parties that shall remain anonymous may have hung an excessively decorated and possibly overpowered large-ish Red Flare not just on powerlines well outside the launch field, but on Regional Rail powerlines well outside the launch field... Fortunately they were not the actual contact wires as initially feared when a train came through almost comically quickly thereafter. We also can't say how but we are improbably able to confirm that the tower lights around the field for night games are in fact very robust to "ballistic incident"...

Phil also dropped off an excellent collection of stuff for the club parts box.

[JP Cardoni]

Love the run down. Sounds like it was bery exciting. 

JP

JP Cardoni
Exhibit A Inc.
309 Foulke Lane

Springfield, PA 19064
Cell: 570 466 1095
JPCa...@ExhibitAdigital.com
www.ExhibtAdigital.com

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