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The Calumet Copperbots are getting ready to defend their state championship Wednesday at the FIRST Robotics State Competition.
LSSU/John Shibley
LSSU engineering alum Derek Wonnacut (MTU masters, doctoral candidate) and team member Lowell Torola.
The Copperbots qualified for the event over the weekend at the district meet at Lake Superior State University.
Calumet also received a creativity award underwritten by Xerox.
More than 40 high school teams from all corners of Michigan competed in this year’s event. A special guest was LSSU engineering alum Trace Hill, who is helping to build NASA’s Space Launch System mega-rocket for a human return to the moon.
Teams have had six weeks to brainstorm, design, and build a fully functional wheeled robot the size of a golf cart that must cross obstacles, and then carry and stack cubes in mock cargo rockets and spaceships on opposite sides of a 27- by 54-foot field.
The state finals are being held at Saginaw Valley State University April 10-13.
