Page 9 - Reading Success B8

Today’s rockets are the products of thousands of years of experimentation
inspired by human ingenuity. The Chinese are generally regarded to have been

the first to use rockets in rituals and war. In the first century A.D., the Chinese
filled bamboo tubes with a simple form of gunpowder made from saltpeter, sulfur,

and charcoal dust. They tossed the bamboo tubes into fires to create explosions
during religious festivals. It is said that perhaps, some of those tubes did not

explode but instead flew out of the flames. The Chinese began to experiment with
the gunpowder-filled tubes and soon came upon the idea of attaching them to

arrows and launching them with bows. Eventually, they discovered that the
gunpowder tubes could launch themselves just by the power produced from the

escaping gas. Hence, the true rocket was born.

The earliest known record of the use of real rockets was in the war between the
Chinese and Mongols in 1232. At the battle of Kai-Keng, the Chinese fired a

barrage of flaming rockets at the invading Mongol horsemen. Also called “Chinese
arrows”, they are the first known solid-propellant rockets and were made from a

tube filled with gunpowder, capped at one end while the other end was left open
and the tube attached to a long stick. When the tube was ignited, the burning

powder produced hot gas that escaped out the open end and produced thrust.
The stick served as a guide that kept the rocket moving forward in the same

direction throughout its flight. It is unclear though just how effective the fire-arrows
were as weapons but they must have drastically terrified the Mongols because at

the following battle, the latter also began making their own rockets, which may
have started the spread of this technology to Europe.

Main Idea

What is the main idea of this story?

a. modern rockets
b. the development of the rocket in China

c. how rockets work
d. how rocket technology has changed over time

12_Reading Success B 8