The Formosan Fox team transports its rocket to the launch site at the 2026 IREC.

A Rocket Inspired by Taiwan’s Maritime Culture

For this year’s competition, the team named its rocket DIVA, inspired by Mazu, Taiwan’s revered goddess of the sea and protector of travelers. The name symbolizes safe journeys and successful voyages—a fitting metaphor for a mission centered on reliable flight, stable communications and full vehicle recovery.

Rather than serving merely as a cultural reference, DIVA reflected the team’s engineering priorities. Every stage of the project emphasized flight safety, mission reliability and successful recovery, translating a traditional cultural symbol into tangible technical objectives.

Left: DIVA undergoes final pre-launch preparations, including system power-up and igniter installation. Right: Members of the NYCU Formosan Fox team pose with the DIVA rocket before launch at the 2026 IREC.

Turning Lessons Into Engineering Solutions

Recovering the rocket intact was one of the team’s primary goals this year. In a previous competition at the Spaceport America Cup, the team was unable to recover the rocket’s nose cone. This experience drove significant improvements to this year’s recovery, tracking and communication systems.

To improve mission reliability, the team developed a non-pyrotechnic separation mechanism and a dual-stage parachute deployment system to reduce opening shock during descent. A dedicated ground communication station also provided real-time telemetry, allowing the team to continuously monitor flight performance, rocket attitude and the predicted landing location, greatly increasing the likelihood of complete vehicle recovery.

The Formosan Fox team presents the DIVA rocket for pre-flight safety inspection before launch at the 2026 IREC.

A Year of Testing, Failure and Refinement

Preparing for IREC required nearly a year of design, manufacturing, testing and repeated revisions. “The greatest challenge in rocket development is rarely the initial design,” said Kao-San Lin, captain of Formosan Fox. “It’s discovering problems during testing and having the determination to solve them, one by one.”
Team members balanced demanding coursework with late-night fabrication and testing sessions, often spending evenings in the workshop after classes. Despite academic deadlines and project pressures, the opportunity to see the rocket successfully lift off remained the team’s strongest motivation.

Professor Lua Kim Boon of NYCU’s Department of Mechanical Engineering, who led the team, said the project demonstrated the students’ ability to integrate engineering design, manufacturing, testing and teamwork into a complete aerospace system. He noted that the competition also provided an invaluable opportunity for students to showcase their technical capabilities on an international stage.

Comprising students from multiple disciplines, the NYCU Formosan Fox team presents the DIVA rocket at 2026 IREC, the culmination of nearly a year of collaborative design, fabrication and testing.

Professor Ying-Hao Liao, director of NYCU’s Institute of Space Systems Engineering (iSSE), encouraged the students for transforming classroom knowledge into real-world engineering experience. From laboratories in Taiwan to the launch fields of Texas, he said, the team had turned pressure into performance while demonstrating the ambition of Taiwan’s next generation of aerospace engineers.

Extending the Mission Beyond the Launch

The DIVA project also expanded beyond rocket engineering through collaborations with Taiwan student satellite team SIGHT Space on a CanSat payload mission, and with the space education initiative Kuroro, a popular educational mascot promoting space science among children.

For the Formosan Fox team, participating in IREC represents more than a single international competition. It is an opportunity to demonstrate the strength of Taiwan’s engineering education while inspiring more young people to explore careers in aerospace science and technology.