Rice University’s largest engineering and student rocketry club, Rice Eclipse, soared to new heights this summer, taking top honors in the 30,000-foot Student Researched and Developed Hybrid Division at the 2025 International Rocket Engineering Competition (IREC). Held in June in Midland, Texas, the global competition brought together more than 2,000 students from 219 university teams across the U.S. and around the world.
The winning rocket, Archimedes II, reached an altitude of 25,163 feet and successfully deployed its drogue as well as a custom-built payload — marking the team’s first successful payload deployment at IREC.
“This win is a reflection of the amazing work that this team has put in to make it happen,” said Lavinia Barker, a senior studying mechanical engineering and Rice Eclipse’s chief engineer for the 2024-25 school year. “We’ve spent countless hours researching, testing and troubleshooting our design to bring it to competition. Seeing these improvements pay off with Archimedes II’s flight and bringing home this win for the second year in a row was incredibly rewarding.”
This year marked the first time in Rice Eclipse history that the team launched two rockets at IREC. In addition to Archimedes II, the team also launched a showcase dual-stage rocket, The Kraken, which featured a successful second-stage motor ignition, only the second in the club’s 11-year history. The Kraken reached a top speed of Mach 2.09, the fastest ever achieved by a Rice Eclipse rocket.
“The Kraken was a demonstration of how much you can learn and accomplish when you push the limits of what seems possible,” said Ilina Goyal, the team’s aerodynamic lead and senior mechanical engineering student. “While we didn’t quite achieve our target of 70,000 feet, the numerous successes of the launch highlight just how far our engineering capabilities have come.”
Looking ahead, Rice Eclipse has set its sights even higher: building a 100,000-foot dual-stage rocket, an ambitious step toward eventually reaching the Kármán line — the edge of space at around 328,000 feet in altitude. The team is also developing its first liquid-fueled engine, Prometheus, which it plans to hot fire within the next year.
“I can’t say how happy and proud I am of the team and all preceding members. This project was four years in the making when it first launched last year, and this year’s win marks our ability to consistently perform and iterate on previous successes,” said Frahanco Deressa, a senior mechanical engineering student and propulsion lead for the 2024-25 school year. “The development and iteration of this flight engine and its small-scale test replica has given the team valuable design and test experience and has boosted our confidence in hybrid rocketry. We can now apply that iteration experience to the club’s first-ever liquid engine campaign, Prometheus. From the propulsion side, completing the club’s biggest project, Archimedes, makes us excited to take on what will be the club’s most complicated challenge.”
While the club’s aerodynamics and propulsion teams continue to innovate in materials, structures and ignition systems, the avionics division looks to build on the successful deployment and operation of its custom hyperspectral camera payload with a motorized stabilization system, introducing new challenges that the team is eager to tackle. Where the deployment of a payload at altitude required careful collaboration between the club’s avionics and aerodynamics divisions, Henry Prendergast, senior mechanical engineering student and avionics lead for the 2024-25 school year, said the integration of active control and the development of custom electronics for the spaceshot project will push the aerodynamics, avionics and propulsion teams to work together closer than ever.
Rice Eclipse is open to all undergraduate students and currently includes members from mechanical, electrical, chemical and civil engineering, among other disciplines. Seventeen team leads and officers attended IREC this year, representing a collaborative spirit that is the core to Rice Eclipse’s success.
“Eclipse is truly unique in how we have been able to blend excellence and ambition with inclusivity and learning,” said Daniel Ramirez, senior mechanical engineering student and club president for the 2024-25 school year. “We work together and support new members while pushing boundaries. We allow anyone with passion and interest to make measurable impacts on our projects and invaluable progress in the practical skills needed to succeed in industry.”
The team credits its success to faculty sponsor Kazimir Karwowski as well as the support of the Oshman Engineering Design Kitchen, Rice Center for Engineering Leadership, the George R. Brown School of Engineering and Computing and industry sponsors Swift and DMC.
To learn more or support Rice Eclipse, visit eclipse.rice.edu.