Mysorean iron-cased rockets
Cohetes de Mysore con carcasa de hierro
- Date
- c. 1780-1799 · confidence high
- Place
- Srirangapatna, Mandya, Karnataka, India
- Credited to
- Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan
- People
- 👤 Hyder Ali1717–1782👤 Tipu1751–1799
- Field
- Conflict
What it is
Gunpowder rockets with a forged-iron casing and a long bamboo rod or sword as a stabiliser, which withstood higher pressure and reached about 2 km. Tipu Sultan used them en masse against the British, especially at Pollilur (1780).
After the fall of Srirangapatna (1799), captured rockets were sent to the Woolwich arsenal, where William Congreve studied them.
What it led to
- British Congreve rocket (1804)
- use of rockets in the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812
- modern military rocketry