Ultimate Birthday Rocket - It's Flying and Burning

When I was a child every birthday was celebrated at least 3 times. One time with your family, one time with your friends and one time in the kindergarten.

In the kindergarten it was always the same procedure, you got a crown, you got the first piece of cake and then; after the cake breakfast you were allowed to start the birthday wish rocket.

A real burning and flying rocket* - and you were allowed to light it.

All the other children sitting around the starting point and clapping in their hands and then the countdown was starting.

10...

9...

8...

7...

6...

5...

4...

3...

2...

1...

0 !

up into the sky...** until you couldn't see the rocket anymore and only small wishes sank back down to the ground...

---

*or a paper napkin/tea bag tube

** maybe it was also just the ceiling, but the rocket disappeared and only small black cloud wishes came down :-)

You only need:

• tea bag (or one layer of a very thin paper napkin)*
• matches/ligher
• fireproof base
• optional: scissors
• optional: bowl for remaining tea

You only need to do:

1. Carefully open the teabag, either with the scissors or by hand
2. Take of the tea and set it aside (you can drink it later)
3. form a tube out of your now empty tea bag
4. Set on the fire proof surface
5. Done, your rocket is ready.

Make sure nothing burnable is in the surroundings.

Don't leave your children unattended.

* It took me a while to figure out which teabag I could use, some of my bags just burned down, the same with all napkins that I tried. So if you make this for a party make sure you test it in advance.

Set it on fire and let it fly and enjoy :-)

The remaining ashes are the wishes that you got for your birthday - 1 big or a lot of small...

Background of this experiment:

The fire burns down and the generated hot air moves up.

Since there is a skeleton of the teabag of remaining fibers the hot air tries to take it up (like a hot air ballon), but its to heavy to get lifted.

When the rocket is almost burned down the weight of the remaining ashes is light enough to lift up and so it flies up.