Mundelein’s Fremont students launch rockets

4 … 3 … 2 … 1 …WHOOOOSH!

The colorful rocket blasted high into the sky, cheered on by jubilant teachers and students, who pointed and laughed as they followed the path of the small missile.

Sixth- and seventh-grade students from the science club at Fremont Middle School in Mundelein spent a recent afternoon launching handmade rockets they built and painted earlier this winter.

The after-school science club studied Newton’s Law of Motion, built paper airplanes, and created simple rocket balloons in preparation for building the model rockets that they received in kits and constructed themselves.

“It was really fun because we got to build the rockets from the pieces that the kit gave us,” explained 12-year-old MacKenzie Linane. “And we got to paint them however we wanted.”

Seventh-grade science teacher Emily Loerraker came up with the idea for building the rockets from her own interests in rocket building that she shares with her 7-year-old daughter, Remy.

Standing in the parking lot behind the school, the young rocketeers were finally able to test their handiwork. One by one they attached the electric leads to the rocket on the launch platform before anxiously pressing the ignition switch.

Some stood frustrated as the rockets failed to take off. But for others, their faces brightened with excitement as smoke shot from the tail and the rocket blasted off skyward.

“I thought it was pretty fun getting to see them go up that high,” said seventh-grader Andrew Hurley. “It didn’t explode or anything. It just went up and came down.”

“They were extremely excited and there was a lot of buzz with the launch date,” Loerraker said. “We heard happy shrieks every time the rocket would go up because they were so happy to see that it worked and that it was their own thing going into the sky.”