1. Big, Bad Black Rock or, How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love... Dust Dave Lindbergh – CMASS

2. Contents (or, questions to be answered) What is the Black Rock Desert? How do you get there? Is it a good place to fly rockets? (yes) What happens there? Do you want to go there next year?

3. CHAPTER 1 Where is the Black Rock Desert??

4. Planet Earth

5. U.S. of A. you are here Black Rock Desert

6. In north western Nevada Black Rock Desert

7. Launch Site

8. Nearest city = 80 miles Nowhere Central

9. CHAPTER 2 OK, whats so great about it?

10. The Black Rock Desert Dry lake bed, considered one of the flattest surfaces on earth 100 miles long, 10 to 40 miles wide 4000 feet high 80+ miles from nearest city Owned by the Bureau of Land Management (public land) Wikipedia: See also - High Power Rocketry

11. playa (ply-ahh) Spanish word, meaning surface of incredibly huge and flat dry lake bed

12. The playa

13. CHAPTER 3 How do you get there?

14. We did it this way

15. Vehicle & Operators 1986 Coachmen 28 motorhome 3 drivers, in shifts 51 hours door-to-playa

16. Route I-90 to Chicago Then I-80 to Nevada Or, you could fly to Reno, then drive – But then how would you get your rockets and motors there? – And what would you live in there?

17. Good place to store rockets & stuff

18. Is that the same place they do that Burning Man thing? Yes.

19. CHAPTER 4 OK, what does it look like already?

20. First view - dawn

31. Setting Up

32. Blowing Dust

35. XPRS Launch Site Waiver to 100,000 feet (& they use it) Closest power line – 20 miles Closest object > 3 inches tall – 5 miles No plants, no animals, no insects No rocket-eating trees (no trees)

36. XPRS = eXtreme Performance Rocket Ships September each year, hosted by AeroPac – Association of Experimental Rocketry of the Pacific http://www.xprs.org

37. ARLISS launch

40. Another ARLISS flight

46. Toward sunset

48. Flightline

50. Cars making dust

52. Surface of the playa

53. Walking out to the pads

55. ARLISS HQ

57. Lonely porta-potty

58. Porta-potty under the stars

59. Porta-potty in space

60. Flightline at night

62. Milky Way

63. Smoke from cookfire

64. Your presenter

65. Our campsite

66. Dust in the morning

70. Waiting out the dust

71. One way to keep out dust

72. Rocket stuff storage tent

73. The next morning

74. Dust gets everywhere

76. Starting to clear

78. But still windy

79. Finally, clear visibility

80. And flying!

81. My camera/GPS rocket

82. Flies well (F40-4)

83. But takes lousy pictures

86. Landing

88. LCO table

89. A nice HPR flight

92. 2 nd stage ignition

96. Tony & Adam w/first rocket

97. It flies great!

99. Vendors

100. More flights

101. Vendors

105. Flying rocketeers

107. Night launch evening

109. Ready for first night launch

117. CATO over LCO table

120. Strobe light on descent

124. Camping on the Playa Bring everything you want to have – Water, food, power, gasoline, rockets… – There is nothing there. Nothing. Cookfires are OK (not on the ground) $8/day to the BLM for camping fees – Plus launch fee (about $40???)

125. Advice Bring water, lots of water Read the website carefully for tips Drive carefully and slowly on the playa – Dont kick up dust Be prepared to camp in the middle of nowhere (the precise center, actually) Bring water, lots of water

126. THANK YOU More info: http://xprs.org http://areopac.org http://nerdfever.comhttp://nerdfever.com (my web site) (all maps & satellite imagery courtesy of Google)