Argentine Students’ Rocket Wins Top Aerospace Prize

Students from the ITBA Rocketry Team in Argentina won first place in the Design and Construction category at the International Rocket Engineering Competition (IREC) 2026 in Texas. The team of over 60 students from the Instituto Tecnológico de Buenos Aires achieved this with their first fully student-developed supersonic rocket, named Aconcagua.

The competition, held June 15 to 20, drew 150 university teams from around the world. In addition to the top score in Design and Construction, the Argentine project ranked seventh in the 30k COTS category, reaching nearly 10 kilometers with a commercial engine, and eleventh for its technical report.

The project involved months of work across multiple disciplines including aerodynamics, avionics, and composite materials. The team aims to establish Argentina within the international aerospace ecosystem and has steadily improved its ranking at the IREC since its founding in 2022. This win demonstrates the potential of Argentine scientific and technological education to compete globally.