Sydney rocketry students crowned as world champions

The USYD Rocketry Team has been announced as the winner of the 2025 International Rocket Engineering Competition (IREC), taking out first place with their latest rocket, Pardalote. In addition to winning the overall New Horizon Award, the team also secured first place in the  Student Research and Developed (SRAD) Hybrid/Liquid Category and were runners-up for both the Jim Furfaro Award for Technical Excellence and the Charles Hoult Award for Modelling and Simulation.

A record-setting 156 student rocketry teams, composed of thousands of university students from across 19 countries, travelled to Midland, Texas to compete in a tense 6 days of competition. The students battled harsh weather conditions including blistering heat and sudden windstorms. 136 teams had their rockets successfully achieve lift off.

Soaring to a height of 10,342 feet (3.15 km), with an error margin of just 3.42 percent, Pardalote achieved the most accurate apogee (point in the orbit of a satellite) ever recorded by a 10k SRAD Hybrid launch vehicle in the history of the competition.

The achievement makes the USYD rocketry team two-time world champions – in 2022, the last time the team attended, they also brought home gold (then called the American  Spaceport Cup) with their rocket, Bluewren. This makes USYD Rocketry the only multiple time winners of the overall competition.

USYD Rocketry Team is Australia’s first tertiary student rocketry team – a dynamic group of student engineers who design and manufacture high-power rockets and space technologies. In 2019, the team was the first Australian team to attend, compete in and win their category at Spaceport America Cup (now known as the IREC).

“Pardalote shows what’s possible when you give a group of passionate multidisciplinary engineers the freedom to lead, design, and build something they genuinely care about,” Ricky Purani, a third-year School of Electrical Engineering student and the team’s Executive Director.

“Launching far from the comfort of our own Australian backyard, Pardalote’s performance on American soil not only broke records of accuracy, but established a new standard for what an undergraduate team can accomplish," said Gigi O’Rourke, currently a third-year student studying a Bachelor Mechanical Engineering with Space.

The Experimental Sounding Rocket Association (ESRA) has operated the competition since 2006, with the IREC achieving international status in 2011. ESRA is a non-profit organisation founded in 2003 for the purpose of fostering and promoting engineering knowledge and experience in rocketry.

Each team is student led, designing, building, testing and launching rockets with CubeSat payloads to target altitudes of either 10,000, 30,000 or 45,000 feet. Rockets are typically 8 to 20 feet (2.3-6 m) long and 4 to 8 inches (10-20 cm) in diameter.

Pardalote takes team to victory

The multi-award winning rocket, Pardalote, is the USYD Rocketry Team’s first fully student researched and developed hybrid rocket. Unlike previous projects that used commercial-off-the-shelf products, students led the design, development, and testing of its hybrid propulsion system, ground infrastructure, airframe, and recovery systems.

“The opportunity to work on a multi-faceted project like this gives undergraduate students the space to apply and develop real world engineering skills, collaborating in a fast-paced and high-stakes environment to achieve ambitious outcomes,” said team Systems Engineer Jack Hughes, currently a third-year student studying a Bachelor of Aeronautical Engineering and Computer Science.

The rocket’s namesake is a small native Australian wren, following a long tradition of the team naming their rockets after native birds, with some predecessors including Rosella and Bluewren.

“Pardalote is ultimately a culmination of the launch vehicle design, engine design, and modelling and simulation learned from past projects and years of hard work, cementing the fundamentals that have paved the way for our most ambitious project to dominate at the world stage,” said team Technical Director Sahaj Mand, currently a third-year studying a Bachelor of Mechatronic Engineering with Space.

Pardalote is propelled by an engine that continues the legacy of the team’s previous student-researched and developed hybrid sub-scale rocket engines Waratah and Wattle.

Engineered using the team’s proprietary hybrid engine simulation suite Candlebark, Pardalote underwent an extensive validation and testing campaign at the University’s Arthursleigh Farm. This included propellant loading and offloading tests, static engine hot fire tests, and full system wet dress rehearsals to ensure flight readiness.

Following testing, the team transported the launch vehicle and all ground support equipment to its dedicated launch site at Tolarno Station in Menindee, a 13-hour drive west of Sydney. There, they conducted a successful test flight, marking a major milestone in the development of USYD Rocketry’s first full-scale hybrid launch vehicle.

Academic supervisor from the School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering, Professor Matthew Cleary said:

“As a School we have built a strong student team culture with USYD Rocketry being a flagship program. We are very proud that they are bringing home the winners’ trophy for a second time. It is a testament to their ability, hard work, and passion. These students are getting a transformative education, incorporating theory and practice along with leadership training covering technical, logistical and operational matters. Rocketry teams from the University of Sydney and the other Australian universities who performed so well at IREC are made up of highly-skilled individuals who will be the backbone of Australia’s future industries.”

-ENDS-