Bellbrook’s program has been in place for five years.
As part of the competition, teams design and build two racing drones, create a trifold display showing the design process, portfolio, and create a marketing video. At the Houston event, teams also race their drones in two different settings: one head-to-head, and one “capture the flag.”
Points are scored on all events and combined to determine the overall champion.
“In Texas, the big thing that happens is the racing,“ said teacher and club advisor Dave Lambright. ”People are most familiar with (head-to-head), where they put on the goggles, and they and another team go through an obstacle course. The first team that completes three laps advances in the bracket."
Capture the flag is played with two teams of two drones, each side assigned red or blue. The field will light up with red and blue beacons, and the first team to fly over all the beacons — switching them to their team color — wins.
“You have to design a drone that is good at both competitions,” Lambright said. “That’s one of the rules.”
Full Throttle was led by pilot and manager Darius Gainer, Ben Downing, Connor Payne, Connor Spriggs, Hayden Fisher, Andrew Bruckart, Zac Hansen and Olin Eppers.
Gainer is the only Bellbrook student to be at Nationals three years, Lambright said.
Bellbrook’s two other teams — Drone-A-Soars and the Flying Saucers — took third and fourth in overall competition, respectively.
Drone-A-Soars team members included sophomores Rithik Mall, Ben Burris, Ahmed El Sharif, Josh Johnson, Jackson Bruckart, Dalton McPeck and Logan Fisher. Juniors Katie Pryor, Erin Secody, Andrew West, Maggie Sahlbom, Caden Fromm and Natasha Leghart made up the Flying Saucers team.
“The Flying Saucers and Drone-A-Soars will have some big shoes to fill next year,” Lambright said. “But I am sure they will be to the task.”
Drones in School is slowly gaining steam in Ohio, but is fast gaining popularity in Florida, where companies like Florida Power and Light use drones to survey hurricane damage.
“Flying drones is something students are interested in, and it’s extremely educational,” Lambright said. “In education, there’s a lot of programs that look nice, but this one is very educational. The amount of work and the emphasis on process is well worth it.”
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