Alex Owen and Dan Murray rose early on May 18 to prepare for the robot games in the National SeaPerch Challenge in Indianapolis. While Murray said they felt confident about presenting their robot to a panel of judges, not everything worked out as planned.

The Boothbay Region High School seniors had qualified to compete against 80 other teams from around the nation at the University of Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI). Their first challenge was the obstacle course, where teams needed to navigate their robots through a series of fixed hoops positioned at various angles.

“We didn't do so hot,” Murray said. “We got tied up.”

Out of two attempts, the electric cord powering their robot got tangled in the hoops like a careless dog on a leash, Murray said. “It was mess. It took us 10 minutes, while the fastest teams were like 56 seconds.”

Things looked better when Owen and Murray moved onto the deep water challenge. Their robot successfully transferred all the rings from a stand to underwater receptacles, but at one Owen jerked the robot back and the arm that's used to dislodge the rings popped off, requiring a diver to reassemble the robot, which resulted in a two minute penalty.

Although the overall competition winners were selected, all the team scores had not yet been posted as of press time; however, Owen estimated they placed middle of the pack.

Even though they weren't winners, Owen and Murray said it was a great experience to meet the other teams and see how everyone approached the same problem in unique and creative ways.

Owen and Murray both agreed the experience helped influence their choice to pursue engineering in college. Owen said he plans to attend Wentworth Institute of Technology to study computer engineering, while Murray said he is considering bioengineering at the University of Maine in Orono.