Yellow Jacket Space Program

The Yellow Jacket Space Program (YJSP) is a student-led organization founded in 2015 to bring advanced rocketry development to the Georgia Institute of Technology. The program has the goal of designing, building, and flying a sounding rocket capable of carrying a 10 kilogram scientific payload past the 100 kilometer Kármán line. The suborbital launch vehicle is planned to be a liquid-fueled, active-controlled rocket with separation and recovery operations. The program has just under 60 members, bringing together undergraduate and graduate students from a variety of disciplines including Aerospace, Mechanical, Electrical, and Industrial Engineering, along with Computer Science and Business. The project is led by students and operates under the faculty advisement of the Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering. YJSP has four overall program goals that guide the development process: 1) Allow students to work on complex, real-world problems that foster the growth of professional engineering skills and knowledge. 2) Promote and improve programs for student rocket engineering within YJSP, the School of Aerospace Engineering,the College of Engineering, and the Georgia Institute of Technology 3) Establish an ongoing, safe program for launch vehicle design, testing, and operation 4) Provide a platform for STEM (Science Technology Engineering Math) outreach opportunities to students of all academic levels throughout the State of Georgia The team pursues these goals through one long-term objective: develop and operate a liquid-fueled sounding rocket capable of delivering a scientific payload above the Kármán Line and return it safely to the ground. This ambitious goal introduces challenges that exceed a student’s typical academic experience. Students involved with YJSP gain skills that are relevant to the aerospace industry to supplement their academics, from systematic mission design to component-level hardware and electronics fabrication.