European Rocketry Challenge

The European Rocketry Challenge (EuRoC) is a rocketry competition that has been taking place since 2020 and is aimed at university student teams from acrosse Europe. The competition is organised by the Portuguese Space Agency and takes place annually in Portugal. The event aims to foster education and innovation in aerospace engineering, and other fields, by allowing students to demonstrate their self build rockets.^[1][2]

Members of the EPFL Rocket Team preparing their rocket for launch during the 2021 EuRoC edition.

The EuRoC was launched in 2020, as a way to support students preparing for the Spaceport America Cup whose plans were disrupted by border closures due to the COVID-19 pandemic. With the European Rocketry Challenge, the Portuguese Space Agency (Agência Espacial Portuguesa) aims to promote space technology and cooperation between European universities and research institutions in Europe.

The Competition

As a competition, the EuRoC involves various challenges in which teams have to design, build and launch rockets. The tasks may vary from year to year, but they are designed to require technical development from the students. Participants not only have to develop a working rocket, but also fulfill certain objectives, such as reaching a certain altitude (3 km or 9 km) and carrying a payload to perform scientific experiments during the flight.

Rockets are built from a variety of materials including wood, aluminium, PA-12 and glass fibre composite.^[3]

Categories and Competitions

Participants compete in various categories, depending on the target altitude of their rockets and the complexity of their designs. The launches are divided into two altitude categories, each further subdivided based on the type of propellant used (liquid, solid, or hybrid):

• 3,000 metres altitude
• 9,000 metres altitude

Teams are evaluated based on criteria such as rocket performance, accuracy in reaching the intended altitude, innovation in design, and operational safety.

Competition History

EuRoC 2020

The EuRoC was held for the first time in 21 to 24 October 2020 in Ponte de Sor (Portugal), during the COVID-19 pandemic. The inaugural edition featured six teams and approximately 120 students.^[4] Since then, the competition has grown steadily, with around 600 students and over 20 teams participating annually.

The participating teams in the first edition with their respective projects were Space Team Aachen (DE) with CARL, Project EULER (CH), Copenhagen Suborbitals with DanSTAR (DK), Air ESIEA (FR) and TU Wien Space Team (AT) with Hound and STR-10.^[5][6]

EuRoC 2021

19 teams with 400 students from 12 European countries took part in the competition.^[7]

• 2Space
• Aerospace Team Graz (Technical Award^[8])
• AGH Space Systems
• Akademische Raumfahrtinitiative Schweiz (Hibrid 9Km Flight Award)
• Aristotle Space & Aeronautics Team (A.S.A.T.)
• Bath University Rocket Team
• CranSEDS
• DanSTAR (Liquid 9Km Flight Award)
• Delft Aerospace Rocket Engineering
• endeavour
• EPFL Rocket Team (EuRoC Award | Hibrid 3Km Flight Award)
• Imperial College London Rocketry (ICLR)
• PoliWRocket (Design Award)
• Propulse NTNU (Solid 9Km Flight Award)
• RED - Rocket Experiment Division
• SimLE SimBa
• Skyward Experimental Rocketry (Solid-3Km Flight Award | Team Award)
• Space Team Aachen

There were 15 launches.

EuRoC 2022

25 teams with 600 students took part in the competition.^[9]

EuRoC 2023

The competition took place from 10 to 16 October 2023 with 25 teams in Constância.^[10]

EuRoC 2024

The event took place at Ponte de Sor Aerodrome and Santa Margarida Military Camp in Constância between 9 and 15 October. Awards were issued for technical report, vehicle design, team effort, flight performance (multiple categories), payload and overall ranking.^[11]