Fifth annual USU Pumpkin Toss most successful yet

By: George Labonty

On Saturday, the USU chapter of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers hosted its fifth annual pumpkin toss at Elk Ridge Park, bringing together nine teams of trebuchet constructors and a few hundred spectators to watch pumpkins be hurled over great distances.

“I’d say this is our most successful year, we’ve had by far the farthest pumpkin ever tossed at our event, a lot of teams and I think we did a pretty good job this year,” said Tim Brenner, a senior majoring in mechanical engineering and pumpkin coordinator for ASME.

Most of the teams were comprised of USU engineering students, but a few were made by members of the community, and Bear River Land Conservancy and CoorsTek Medical both brought teams of their own.

Each of the nine teams competed in two events, testing accuracy and distance respectively.

For the accuracy competition, members of ASME along with several volunteers set up dozens of targets across the firing range, including dumpsters, trash cans, the bed of a dump truck and an old minivan for the trebuchets to try to hit.

The teams had roughly twenty minutes to fire as many pumpkins as they could to hit, or get close to, as many targets as possible. While more than fifty pumpkins were tossed, only a handful actually hit anything, but the crowd still audibly oohed and aahed for almost every single pumpkin.

“Honestly it’s just cool to see them throw the pumpkins. They all go so high and it’s just fun to watch, even if they don’t hit anything,” said David Mulligan, a sophomore majoring in mechanical engineering.

After that, the trebuchets were tested for distance, for which ASME quartered off a section of the park about the size of two football fields.

Most of the trebuchets managed to hurl their pumpkins more than 200 feet, but trebuchet number five, a very complicated, multi-staged device managed to hurl a pumpkin 650 yards, out past the edge of the field.

“We mainly designed this thing last year, but we made several improvements on it this year, adding metal pieces, adjusting the triggers, getting a new arm, and doing the math,” said Spencer Mathias, also a senior in mechanical engineering one of the team members who built trebuchet number five. Mathias had with him a whole folder of papers showing the mechanics of the trebuchet, the paths of the various moving parts, and calculated distances based on the size of pumpkins and counterweights used.

In between events, while the judges tallied scores, hollowed-out pumpkins filled with candy were tossed for the kids. The kids all gathered at the edge of the safety tape, and waited for one of the trebuchets to launch the pumpkin and the instant it hit the ground, swarms of children would rush out into the field to gather the candy now scattered all over the ground. One candy-filled pumpkin was launched for each age group, with even those who were babies to age 2 being carried by parents or pushed in strollers.

Awards were given out to all of the highest-scoring trebuchet teams. Trebuchet number 5 took first place, followed by a second USU team and the Bear River group.

Brenner said he was glad this year’s event had so many participants.

“Next year’s event is gonna be even bigger and better, so everyone should come out for that one too,” he said.

For anyone interested in building a trebuchet for next year’s toss, ASME’s pumpkin toss page, asme.usu.edu, has requirements and tips on how to build one.

— austinlabonty@gmail.com