The University of Georgia Rocketry team, a division of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics UGA Chapter, recently attended the 2026 International Rocket Engineering Competition, and this group is shooting for the stars.
The team spent the past year designing and building their rocket “Magnolia,” which was successfully launched on June 17th at the competition in Midland, Texas.
Competing in the 10k apogee category, Magnolia reached an altitude of 10,201 feet (just a 2% margin of error). This high achievement, in addition to the successful deployment of the airbrakes system and recovery, landed the team in 2nd place in the category and an overall 5th place out of 143 teams from around the world.
IREC is the largest collegiate rocketry competition in the world, hosted annually by the Experimental Sounding Rocket Association (ESRA), a non-profit organization that fosters education in the field of aerospace engineering.
