Payloads
If you wish to read more about the payloads, you can view our official documentation for each year here.
2025-2026: ZOMBIE + GRAVE
Challenge: The payload has to survive the launch, deploy autonomously after the rocket lands, and extract a substantial volume of soil from the ground. Teams were tasked with proving their mechanism could penetrate the terrain, secure the physical sample inside a containment unit, and record data during the extraction process without human intervention.
Design/Execution: The payload system consisted of two integrated mechanisms: ZOMBIE, a self-righting lander, and GrAVE, the deployment system used to eject it from the nosecone. The launch vehicle was named Jackpot. GrAVE used a set of internal rails, an electronic latch, and a lead-screw pusher plate to eject ZOMBIE from the nosecone after landing. At its top, ZOMBIE contained a compartment housing four STEMnaut figures. Once deployed and on the ground on its side, ZOMBIE unfolded four legs hinged to its base. These legs were attached with struts to a collar that extended via a second lead screw, rotating the payload housing into a vertical, upright orientation. Once stabilized, ZOMBIE deployed an extending auger that simultaneously rotated and advanced into the soil, drilling effectively into compacted launch field terrain. As the auger reached full extension, it continued to spin, directing soil through fixed internal elements into a collection chamber. A 7-in-1 soil sensor positioned within the chamber collected pH, electrical conductivity, and nitrate-nitrogen readings from the funneled sample. All measurements were timestamped and stored on an internal SD card.
2024-2025: WARHEAD
Challenge: NASA tasked teams with simulating human spaceflight telemetry and crew safety. Teams had to safely transport fragile humanoid figures through the extreme G-forces of launch, deployment, and landing. Additionally, the payload had to act as a localized communication hub, using an APRS (Automatic Packet Reporting System) to transmit vital flight parameters (such as altitude, descent rate, and GPS location) back to a ground station to verify the “crew’s” safety post-landing.
Design/Execution: WARHEAD’s (Wireless APRS Relay for High-altitude Environmental & Atmospheric Data) core capsule subsystem was the STEMCRaFT (STEMnaut Capsule Radio Frequency Transmitter), which served as a secure containment vessel for four STEMnaut figures and housed the avionics suite. The electronics architecture included two internal subsystems: FUSE (Flight Unit for Sensing & Evaluation) and SWITCH (Scheduled Wireless Information Transmission & Compilation Hub), along with TORCH (Transmission Operations Relay for Capsule Handling). The onboard sensors continuously sampled flight data during descent, including altitude and acceleration. Upon landing, the system automatically transmitted the recorded flight telemetry and STEMnaut survivability data to the team’s ground station via the APRS network. The team earned a 2nd-place overall finish at the 2024-2025 competition, placing 2nd in the payload challenge.
2023-2024: STEMnauts Atmosphere Independent Lander (SAIL)
Challenge: Teams had to design an active-control descent vehicle capable of separating from the main rocket airframe and actively flying itself to a soft landing using rotors, propellers, or thrust vectoring.
Design/Execution: The payload was named SAIL (STEMnauts Atmosphere Independent Lander). Its goal was to safely transport four STEMnaut figures from the launch vehicle to the ground without the use of a parachute, using a contra-rotating set of rotor blades powered by an electric motor. SAIL was housed inside a deployment bay attached to the nose cone. The deployment bay contained an RF-controlled electronic latch that retained SAIL during flight. During descent, the deployment bay separated from the launch vehicle at the main parachute ejection event and descended under the nose cone parachute. Once RSO permission was granted, the RF-controlled latch released SAIL from the deployment bay, at which point the rotor blades unfolded, and the motor began spinning them, generating lift to slow the descent. The rotor blades operated based on pre-derived lift curves until landing. SAIL was designed to land in an upright orientation on four deployed landing legs.
During the competition flight, the deployment bay retention and separation systems performed as designed. However, immediately following SAIL’s release, an unexpected ESC failure occurred, preventing the rotors from generating sufficient thrust. Lacking aerodynamic deceleration, SAIL sustained a hard landing. Despite the payload failure, the launch vehicle itself performed successfully, securing the team a 5th-place overall competition finish.
You can read more about sail here.
2022-2023: SOCS (Sensor Orientation Camera System)
Challenge: NASA required payloads to act like early-stage planetary probes assessing their environment. After the rocket landed in an unknown orientation, the payload had to wait for and decode specific Radio Frequency Commands (RAFCO) sent from a remote ground station. Based on those commands, the payload had to determine its spatial orientation and capture clear photographs of the surrounding terrain to send back to the team.
Design/Execution: The payload was named SOCS (Surrounding Optics and Communication System). SOCS consisted of a RAFCO (Radio Frequency Command) receiver and a camera system mounted in the fin can of the launch vehicle under transparent teardrop-shaped camera housings. The system was designed to receive RAFCO commands transmitted over APRS from the ground station. These commands consisted of camera controls and editing instructions to be interpreted and carried out within 30 seconds of receipt. The camera system consisted of four cameras mounted to four servos, attached directly to the primary payload computer, enabling 360-degree rotation around an axis normal to the ground. The onboard computer interpreted the RAFCO commands and directed the servo-actuated camera to capture the required environmental photograph. The resulting image was saved to onboard storage.
Two weeks before the competition, a catastrophic motor failure (CATO) destroyed the launch vehicle and the original SOCS hardware. The team executed a complete rebuild of the payload electronics and housing in time for the Huntsville launch. During the competition flight, the payload landed safely and the recovery system performed as intended. The RAFCO signal was successfully received, the IMU-derived orientation was calculated, and the required environmental photographs were captured.
2021-2022: MOMO & APPA
Challenge: NASA challenged teams to design a payload that could determine its exact landing zone grid location using only internal sensors and visual odometry. The strict constraints forbade the use of GPS receivers or magnetic compasses.
Design/Execution: The team developed two sensor-fusion payloads, MOMO and APPA, to navigate a GPS-denied environment. The launch vehicle was named Catastrophe. APPA, the primary scored payload housed in the fin can, integrated an IMU, a barometric altimeter, and two side-mounted cameras. The flight software used a combination of image recognition applied to notable landmarks in descent photos and dead-reckoning algorithms driven by IMU acceleration and pressure data to calculate a ballistic trajectory and estimate the landing location. The estimated coordinate was cross-referenced against pre-loaded aerial map data using the camera imagery. During the competition launch, MOMO failed to record usable data due to camera connection issues upon ejection. APPA, however, successfully logged sensor data throughout the entire flight profile. After landing, APPA’s software fused the recorded pressure, acceleration, and imagery data to generate an estimated landing coordinate, completing the mission objective.
2020-2021: LOPSIDED-POS
Challenge: This challenge required teams to deploy a lander during the rocket’s descent. Once on the ground, the lander had to perform a 360-degree site survey by taking a panoramic photograph.
Design & Execution: The payload was named LOPSIDED, housing the Planetary Observation System (POS) camera array. LOPSIDED was retained in the payload bay top-first, held by an electronic rotary latch and nylon shear pins. At apogee, the latch unlocked, leaving only the shear pins retaining the payload. At 700 ft AGL, the main parachute deployed, pulling LOPSIDED upward, breaking the shear pins, and extracting it from the payload bay. Redundant Jolly Logic Chute Releases prevented premature payload parachute deployment until 600 ft AGL. At 500 ft AGL, an ARRD (Advanced Retention Release Device) separated LOPSIDED from the main recovery harness, allowing it to descend under its own independent parachute. After landing, two solenoid latches unlocked, allowing LOPSIDED to self-level via gravity. Once settled, the onboard Raspberry Pi simultaneously captured images from the Planetary Observation System camera modules and executed a stitching algorithm to produce a leveled 360-degree panorama of the landing site.
2019-2020: Burrito
Challenge: Teams were required to design and deploy a small rover capable of planetary collection. The rover had to survive the launch, eject from the rocket after landing, navigate away from the launch vehicle across terrain, and successfully collect a simulated sample represented by ground materials on the launch field.
Design/Execution: Its chassis was constructed from high-density 3D-printed components, packaging a drivetrain, steering mechanism, and mechanical scoop inside the rocket’s body tube. To prevent the rover from flipping on uneven terrain, the battery packs and heavy electronics were mounted centrally to establish a low center of gravity. The onboard microcontroller was programmed with autonomous navigation and scoop actuation sequences to locate and collect a minimum of 10 mL of ice sample and drive a minimum of 10 linear feet from the collection site.
During a subscale test launch, the rocket drifted off its nominal trajectory and landed in an irrigation ditch, fully submerging the rover. The team recovered the payload, fully disassembled the chassis, and dried the electronics. Despite the water exposure, the rover was successfully reassembled. During subsequent testing, it successfully ejected from the airframe, navigated the terrain, and collected the simulated ice sample. BURRITO was confirmed to have been successfully retained during the full-scale demonstration flight.
2018-2019: The Eagle and the Egg
Challenge: NASA required students to design a UAV (drone) that could survive the extreme G-forces of launch inside the rocket. After landing, the rocket had to deploy the drone, which was required to autonomously fly to a specific coordinate zone and drop a navigation beacon to assist future hypothetical missions.
Design/Execution: The deployment bay was anchored by a robust 0.5-inch-thick birch plywood bulkhead. To keep the UAV secure during the violent boost and ejection phases, the team designed a custom latching mechanism powered by a stepper motor. This system tightly gripped the drone during flight and provided a clean release mechanism once the rocket was safely on the ground. After the launch vehicle touched down, the stepper motor actuated, releasing the latching mechanism and opening the deployment bay. The UAV powered up its rotors, launched directly from the rocket’s body, and executed an autonomous flight path to a predetermined coordinate.
2017-2018: Rover
Challenge: This challenge required teams to deploy a ground vehicle capable of clearing the landing zone. The rover had to autonomously deploy from the landed rocket, drive a minimum lateral distance of 5 feet to clear the “blast zone,” and mechanically unfold a set of solar panels to simulate power generation.
Design/Execution: The payload system featured a rover housed inside the payload tube, which rotated freely about a Lazy Susan bearing system during flight. Upon landing, the payload tube self-righted via this bearing, and an electric latch unlocked to free the rover. The rover then autonomously drove 5 feet in any direction from the rocket body using geared motors, tracking distance via onboard sensors. Once the 5-foot distance was achieved, the microcontroller triggered fold-out mechanical arms attached to the chassis. As the arms rotated, the simulated solar panels unfurled and locked into the deployed position.
2016-2017: Piston Battering Ram (PBR)
Challenge: This challenge required teams to eject their payload at the rocket’s apogee. As the payload descended on its own parachute, an onboard camera and processing system had to actively scan the ground, identify specific high-contrast targets set up in the landing field, and track them.
Design/Execution: The payload was named the Piston Battering Ram (PBR), comprising two primary subsystems: the Target Differentiation System (TDS) and the Upright Landing System (ULS). The payload was ejected from the launch vehicle at apogee via an ARRD pyrotechnic tether-and-release device and descended under its own independent parachute. During descent, the TDS used a Raspberry Pi 3 Model B microcomputer and a Raspberry Pi Camera Module v2 to actively capture images of the landing zone. Custom computer vision software processed the images onboard, identified the competition targets on the field, and differentiated between them. After touchdown, the servo-controlled ULS deployed to upright the payload from its resting orientation if required, with onboard orientation sensor telemetry confirming the upright landing. During the full-scale test flight, the fin detached from its parachute and fell ballistically, and the payload failed to engage both the TDS target differentiation system and the ULS upright landing system. Repairs and design changes were made before the competition launch.
2015-2016: STORM
Challenge: Autonomously retrieve a pre-placed soil sample, load it into the rocket, erect the rocket to launch position, and insert the motor igniter without human intervention.
Design/Execution: The designed STORM (System To Orient Rocket on Mars), a large ground-based autonomous system comprising three primary subsystems: a robotic arm assembly, a rocket erection assembly, and an igniter insertion assembly, all mounted to a supporting frame. The autonomous sequence began with the robotic arm initializing and moving to a predetermined location where the sample payload had been placed. The arm grasped the cylindrical sample with its gripper, moved it to the rocket’s payload bay door, and carefully inserted it into a polyurethane Pick ‘N Pluck foam-lined compartment. After securing the sample, the arm closed the payload bay door and moved to a safe standoff position. The rocket erection subsystem then raised the launch rail and vehicle from horizontal to 85 degrees from horizontal. Finally, the igniter insertion subsystem extended a wooden dowel carrying an electric match into the motor, preparing the rocket for launch.