My No. 2 Estes Sky Writer, a much longer rocket than the Alpha, came pretty darned close to disappearing on a C6-7 when I launched it the first time a few years ago. It was in an early July evening during that moment shortly before dusk when the air becomes very still. It was, and still is, the only launch that I ever made that went perfectly straight up, with no drift. Me and members of my family who were visiting strained to see it. I totally lost sight of it for a couple of seconds, and then just at the very limits of my eyesight I was able to just discern the tiniest little squirt of tracking smoke, w-a-a-a-a-y-y-y up there. Imagine seeing a housefly at 30 feet away - that's what it looked like. I listened for the pop of the ejection charge, but it was just too far away. So I figured that I had lost it. But I kept straining to see something, and a second or so later I saw what might or might not have been a microscopic little speck in the sky. I wasn't sure if it was really there or if I just saw something because I wanted to see something, but I kept staring at it and I called it out to everyone. After almost a minute I could see that it was getting bigger and that's when I knew that it was real and not my imagination. It was another 45 seconds or so before I felt pretty sure that it was indeed my rocket. Several minutes later it gently dropped back to the ground on it's 12" parachute.
The incredible thing was that it came back down inside the little high school softball field that I launched it from, and didn't go into the trees. I launched it from shallow left field and it came down just inside the fence deep in the right field pocket. I have never had such still air for a launch ever before and I have never had anything like that since. Now this was with my Sky Writer on a C6-7. Imagine what an Alpha would have done on the same motor in those same conditions.
Who says that LPR can't be exciting?
P.S. My launch site is at 1700 feet ASL; IOW, not terribly high by any means.
And the Streak looks like a Big Bertha except smaller.:roll: How tall is it?
