"Will This Rocket burst"??

Guess, it takes a satellite launch for me to start blogging again. This time, its 'Risat-2', India's own digital 'spy sat' in space, meant to keep a tab on our borders and infiltrators. Of course, ISRO did its best to assert that it was not a 'spy sat'.
But then as Arun Ram told me, all sats are spy sats, except this time around we will get digital images of almost everything. This one can image a number plate on a vehicle, it is believed.

But what got me writing this is the first place was this:



Ok..I dint get such a good picture of these two kids. They were there opposite the spaceport near the Pulicat Lake where a few of us media ppl were, to watch the launch. 6 am for any kid is too early...but then they decided to come there and watch a live rocket take off for real. They will remember this for the rest of their lives. Wonder what will happen when they return to school and tell their friends. 'Whoaaaa....the rocket went like this, like that...fire came from below....and stuff'

Children are children and questions they ask will dumbfound anyone(Mom tells me I used to keep asking questions non stop about anything and everything when I was a kid!!). The innocence in the question struck everyone standing on the solitary bird watch tower opposite the spaceport.

As the rocket took off, we were busy taking pictures, while the Times Now crew went live from there as they were told OB vans will not be allowed inside to cover the launch (spy sat...see?)! As the rocket went up, one of the kids said 'it's like a flower pot'!!

Then the other one asked her father, who was busy watching the rocket..."Appa, appa...inda rocket vedikuma, vedikada?" (will this rocket burst or not?"). For a country that celebrates Diwali in a grand manner, I believe this one question summed it all up. For a child, it was equivalent to just an ordinary firecracker going up.

I am sure she would have gone back home and asked her dad who lit the wire on the rocket for so much fire to come out of the bottom? May be, once she grows up, she ll come to know of the significance of the launch and may be proud of the fact that it was meant to help Indians keep their country a little more safer from enemies.

But that one question... I will remember for my lifetime!! More than covering the launch, that single question made it worthwhile that I did not go inside the spaceport and watch the launch from the reporters gallery!!