By Nida Merchant
To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 trip to the moon, the City of Sugar Hill hosted a Rocket Launch Celebration at Gary Pirkle Park.
Adults and children alike gathered near the rocket launch station to witness five rockets launch from the park. The mini rockets were sent off at exactly 9:32 am, the same time astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins blasted off to the moon.
Communities in the nearby area received an invitation from the U.S Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama who launched a world record 5,000 rockets into the air. The invitation asked nearby cities to embrace the space program at a local level. Sugar Hill accepted the challenge.
“This event was a great opportunity to celebrate one of man’s greatest achievements in stepping on land that isn’t even on Earth,” Council Member Taylor Anderson stated.
The city hosted an event with a theme that was unique to ones they had held in the past. The overall goal, however, was to give children an opportunity to explore a career that goes beyond anything they could imagine. Families were given the opportunity to build their own rockets in the E Center with the help of dedicated students such as Seth Cohen. They were then given the chance to blast off their creations across from the Bowl of Sugar Hill with the help of city staff.
“I’m sure we have launched at least 500 or 600 rockets in the bowl by now. The E Center was packed in the morning!” Council Member Marc Cohen exclaimed.
Though the rockets may have been small, the smiles of the children were huge as they saw their self-made rocket fly across the Sugar Hill amphitheater on the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission.
