Schools
Hauppauge High School Technology Club Wins Crowd Favorite
The students built a 20-foot tall MURLIN arm trebuchet that was the talk of the town at the annual Long Island Pumpkin Fling Championship.
The Hauppauge High School Technology Club won the Crowd Favorite Award at the Long Island Pumpkin Fling Championship. The team, which competes under the name “The Hauppauge Hurlers,” built a 20-foot tall MURLIN trebuchet for the competition.
Recently held at the Suffolk County Farm and Education Center in Yaphank, the Pumpkin Fling is “Long Island’s annual championship pumpkin catapult contest where students get a unique opportunity to experience the joys and trials of designing, building and operating sophisticated mechanical devices,” stated Technology Club Adviser Chris Dowd. “The student’s choice to build a 20-foot tall MURLIN arm trebuchet was the talk of the town at this year’s Pumpkin Fling. Spectators couldn’t help but come and ask about it. The intriguing design earned the club the Crowd Favorite Award.”
According to Dowd, “MURLIN stands for multi radius linear nodes. This makes the arm act like a giant cam and allows for 360 degrees of rotation. This allows for a greater speed to be reached and imparted to the projectile increasing how far it can travel.”
