STUDENTS and teachers were left in awe whan a half million pound space roicket landed in Darwen in 2009.
Darwen Vale High School was one of the first schools in the country to welcome the one-man Nova Starchaser rocket.
Year seven and eight pupils took a break from lessons to quiz the rocket’s maker Steve Bennett.
They also took part in space based workshops in cosmic chemistry and propulsion to celebrate its arrival.
In a drive to get children interested into science, pupils and teachers fired questions at Starchaser’s managing director — and now some pupils hope one day to fly in space.
Mr Bennett gave up building rocket parts for a company to set up Starchaser in 1992 as an experimental rocket test programme.
After nearly a decade of work and other rocket launches, the company started developing Nova in 2001.
It claimed to be the world’s first privately-built reusable rocket and aims to heights of 20,000ft.
Starchaser aimed to one day develop a rocket to enable ordinary members of the public to take affordable trips into space.
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