The airplane Alpha 2010 was an improvement of the airplane EESC-USP Regular 2010, designed to the international competition AeroDesign East 2010.

Basically, the team redesigned the structures of that airplane, diminished its dimensions, introduced a brake mechanism and also designed new interfaces that permitted the complete disassembling of the plane and its arrangement into a low volume box.

Even with the reduced time of Project, the team reached the 3rd position in the first phase of the competition, which accounted the Technical Report and the Oral Presentation.

With the result, the team went to the next day prepared to risk soon in the first flight attempt, for which the plane was loaded with 28.66lb (13kg) of payload. However, problems in the landing gear impeded the take-off. For the next attempt, the team planned to fly with lower payload, to guarantee the classification. Then, the airplane was loaded with only 22.04lb (10kg), and it flew easily. However, the wheel detached from the main landing gear in the landing, and the flight was invalidated.

 After the two failures, the team prepared to the next flight, since it would be the last chance of classification. The airplane was loaded with 15.43lb (7kg), it took-off, it flew and it landed without any problem. The classification of the team provoked great commemoration of the members.

Still in the Saturday afternoon, the team had a new flight attempt, which failed due to a strong rain that reached the runway at the moment. Then, the most loaded flights were all postponed to the last day of competition.

In the Sunday, the team started with 27.56lb (12.5kg) of payload, with success. Next, the airplane flew with 28.97lb (13.14kg). In the landing, the airplane could stop exactly in the limit of the runway, and this battery score left the team leading the competition! This achievement caused an euphoric commemoration of all members of the EESC-USP Team.

Then, the organizers opened a new battery for the 10 best placed team of the Regular Class. The Alpha team planned to increase the payload lifted, intending to beat a possible increase of the others teams’ scoring.  In the battery, the Tucano team, from UFU, flew with nearly 31lb (14kg) and it still obtained the bonus for stopping in the landing.

The flight of the Alpha team was extremely exciting. After the take-off, the airplane hardly gained altitude and it flew few centimeters from the ground. After some while, the plane could reach some meters of altitude, and then approached to land. In the landing, the airplane touched the wheels in the beginning of the runway, it bounced, and it returned to the ground 100ft (30.5m) forward, impeding the stop before the limit of 200ft (61m).

Then, the team Alpha 2010 finished in 2nd Place Overall, after the winner Tucano, from UFU, and both teams will represent Brazil in the Regular Class of the AeroDesign East competition.

In the sixth participation of the team in the Open Class, the project aimed the capability of transporting the maximum weight allowed by the Rules:  77.16lb (35kg) of MTOW. The main innovations of the airplane were the employment of 2 Rossi .60 engines and of a new airfoil designed by the team.

In the project competition, the team reached the 1st place in the Technical Report and the Oral Presentation, what already gave us two honorable mentions.

In the Friday, first day of flights, the team had problems with the 2.4GHz receptors, what impeded us of flying in the first classificatory battery.

On the Saturday morning, after the problems were fixed, the airplane flew easily with 49.8lb (22.6kg) of payload, classifying the team to the next batteries. In the afternoon of the same day, the Charlie tried to fly with 55.3lb (25.1kg) of payload. But due to a strong rain that felt, the airplane couldn’t take-off.

In the first attempt of Sunday, the airplane flew with the maximum weight (77.16lb of MTOW), what caused strong excitement of all the team members! However, it didn’t stop inside a 200ft section of the runway and so it lost an important bonus.

Since the victory in the competition demanded the airplane stop inside a 200ft section, we tried two more times. In the first, the airplane hit an obstacle in the landing, and the flight was invalidated. In the second, the airplane didn’t take-off.

In the end of the competition, the team was in 2nd Place Overall, but took all the honorable mentions of the Open Class:
- Best Project
- Best Oral Presentation
- Best Payload Prediction
- Highest Payload