Who Rules the Skies? RotorJackets
By: George Spencer | Categories: Alumni Interest
Wearing FPV (First-Person Viewer) goggles, current president Ian Boraks, Dylan Wyckoff, Beard, and Luke Lawver, AE 21, MS AE 23, jockeyed their whirring marvels in 100 mph head-to-head bouts against other schools. These 90-second races demanded lightning-fast reflexes. Pilots twisted, dove, and shot through obstacles in ways that would have impressed Han Solo.
“Watching something you built fly is a great experience,” says computer engineering major Boraks, who, like other club members, makes what he flies. “There’s definitely an engineering part to it. It’s one thing to do calculations for an airplane in class, but when you build one and feel how it performs, you get an intuition.”
Though he worries privacy fears give drones a bad rap, he points to their ever-
growing use in the military, the media, real estate, search-and-rescue, and for deliveries. “I see a lot of promise for drones in the future,” he says.
