Four student engineering teams at Boston College

Card drawings are illustrative. Baldwin-1 is a design model.

Meet the people ↓
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AeroEagles members working around a table, under a whiteboard reading AeroEagles Mission Control Center

Wind Spirit · High-power rocketry

AeroEagles

AeroEagles will design, manufacture, test, launch and safely recover a reusable high-powered rocket carrying an autonomous payload. After landing, the payload finds a passive visual target and measures its distance without GPS.

Baldwin-1 preliminary design review in revision · 27 Oct 2026

Overview

What the team does

The team is working toward NASA Student Launch 2027 with Baldwin-1, a single-stage vehicle with three sections tethered through descent and one central avionics bay. Every flight feeds a model-to-test loop: predict the flight, fly it, compare, and update the next design.

Engineering objectives

  • Launch and safely recover a reusable high-power rocket
  • Carry an autonomous payload that ranges a passive visual target without GPS
  • Treat recovery as mission-critical, with independent checks before every flight
Program
NASA Student Launch 2027
Proposal submitted 14 Sep 2026
Vehicle
Baldwin-1
Madcow 6 in G12 airframe, 330 cm long (design baseline)
First launch day
3 flown · 2 recovered
19 Sep 2026
Certifications
1 × HPR Level 1
Earned on the first launch day

  1. Structure

    Airframe, fins, motor mount, couplers and bulkheads.

  2. CAD & integration

    Full-vehicle CAD, drawings and interface checks.

  3. Avionics

    Altimeters, tracking, power distribution and the avionics bay.

  4. Recovery

    Parachute sizing, dual-deployment sequencing and descent analysis.

  5. Payload

    Camera ring and LiDAR rangefinding on an onboard computer, no GPS.

  6. Media & documentation

    Social media, photography and the team's written record.

Current projects

On the bench now

Rendered side view of the Baldwin-1 rocket design

Preliminary design review, in revision · Oct 2026

Baldwin-1

Our NASA Student Launch 2027 vehicle. Single stage, three sections tethered through descent, one central avionics bay. The payload uses a camera ring and LiDAR rangefinding to find a passive visual target after landing, without GPS.

Length
330 cm
Diameter
15.7 cm
Airframe
Madcow 6 in G12
Simulated apogee
1,506 m

OpenRocket simulation with the L1940X placeholder motor. Motor not yet selected. PDR design baseline, Oct 2026.

Video library

Tests, launches and builds

  • Test footage

    AeroEagles flight footage

    A rocket in flight, from the team's own footage.

Technical documents

Reports and reviews

Not published yet

Design reports, specifications and public review materials.

Progress and milestones

Where it stands

  1. 14 Sep 2026Done

    NASA Student Launch proposal submitted

    AeroEagles submits its NASA Student Launch 2027 proposal for the Baldwin-1 mission.

  2. 19 Sep 2026Done

    First launch day: three up, two back

    Jack Tommaney, Lucas DiMarco and Vedarsh Mishra took three rockets to the field for the team's first high-power outing. All three left the rail cleanly, and two were recovered. AeroEagle-1, on an AeroTech H100W, flew strongly on ascent, but its parachute didn't deploy as intended and it landed beyond the search area. Because it wasn't retrieved, the team records this as a recovery-system failure rather than guessing at a component. Jack Tommaney earned Level 1 certification on the day.

    What we're changing

    • Keep the model-to-test loop: predict the flight, fly it, compare, update the next design.
    • Verify deployment logic, hardware, packing and triggers independently before every flight.
    • Record the complete flight-ready configuration before launch.
    • Add a tracker or beacon so a rocket that drifts can still be found.
  3. 27 Oct 2026In progress

    Baldwin-1 preliminary design review

    In revision.

  4. 2027Upcoming

    NASA Student Launch 2027

    The program Baldwin-1 is being designed for.

Team

Who's building it

Team lead and subsystem leads

Team Lead Jack Tommaney Aero Lead +1 role Subsystem Lead Matthew Bristing Structure Lead Subsystem Lead Lucas DiMarco CAD & Integration Lead +1 role Subsystem Lead Vedarsh Mishra Avionics Lead +2 roles Subsystem Lead Carson Matckie Recovery Lead Subsystem Lead Lily Zheng Social Media Lead Subsystem Lead Logan Gale Social Media Lead Subsystem Lead Mat Hark Documentation Lead Subsystem Lead Raei Gezahegn Photography Lead

See how this team connects to the rest of MechaEagles on the People page.

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