By Kristin Sommers (October 24, 2002)
 

GM senior Ellis Langford returned earlier this week from the 14th World Space Modeling Championship (WSMC) with two bronze medals, one for individual achievement, the other for team. The WSMC is a 10-day rocket competition west of Prague in the Czech Republic. Langford's team competed for the United States against 20 other teams from around the world. His medals were for participation in the scale competition. The three events that his team competed in were Flight Duration, a test of the amount of time a rocket is able to stay in the air; Altitude, how high the rocket flies; and Scale, which measures a team's ability to create a rocket that is realistic. "Scale is the most difficult competition," said Langford, "as the competitors use a model and data to construct their rocket, which the judges then compare with the data the team has been given to see if the model matches up with the data."

The Mayor of Kralupy N Vlatavou awards the bronze  medal to George Mason senior Ellis Langford for his  achievements in the World Space Modeling  Championship (Photo by John Langford)

Langford began preparing for this year's competition when he was selected for the US team a year ago. Each member of the team spends this time making their own model, and then meet one another at the competition. All the motors are ordered in advance, and, so as to insure fairness in the competition, they are tested for a certain amount of power.

Teams stay in blocks of hotel rooms together and for each event, every team selects three of its members to compete. The three competitors receive individual scores, which are then added together to determine the team's score in an event. The team with the highest score then wins that competition.

Langford said his favorite part of the experience was when once, after a model crashed, the whole team came together to rebuild it and finished in two hours. This was unique because model rebuilding usually takes upwards of twenty hours.

This is Langford's second consecutive year taking home a medal in the global competition, having received a silver medal in the 13th WSMC. He has also received awards in five national competitions.