Livin’ on a Prayer
Why do some rocket scientists pray before a launch?
Rockets are awe-inspiring displays of human endeavour and technological advancement, and behind these remarkable achievements are dedicated teams of scientists and engineers who meticulously plan and execute every detail. During the news coverage on the recent Chandrayaan-3 launch, it was brought to the limelight that some ISRO scientists paid a pre-launch visit to the Venkateswara Swami Temple in Tirupati.
It might come as a surprise that one of the foremost scientific organizations of the country has superstitions imbibed in its practices, but what is even more surprising is that other space agencies such as NASA and Roscosmos also have their own set of pre-launch traditions, such as carrying a stuffed animal, cooking baked beans or even taking a leak on a bus tire.
Superstitions have persisted throughout human history, offering a way to cope with uncertainty and seek control over uncontrollable situations. In the context of rocket launches, superstitions provide a much needed psychological boost when there are umpteen modes of failure. Acknowledging this reality, space agencies conduct many simulations, calculations, and risk assessments to mitigate potential failures, and superstitions offer a “mental hack” to stop one from being constantly reminded of the innumerable and even unknown challenges that can arise.
This also coincided with an interesting dialogue in the Oppenheimer movie teaser as well, where a similar situation arises in case of failure of the Manhattan Project:
- Stakes are extremely high — possible long-term damage to humans along with an extraordinary financial cost of development
- Difficult and long endeavour — many scientists spent years living in monastic conditions to build it
- Innumerable modes of failure — known and unknown
The tense dialogue between Cilian Murphy (with a cigarette in his hand) and Matt Damon highlights the difficulty of the situation. More importantly, “what do you want from theory alone?” is a profound question that further emphasizes the not-yet-captured modes of uncertainty (interested folks can read another article of mine to go deeper into the rabbit hole)
In summary, praying before a launch serves as a source of comfort in the face of inherent risks associated with such a difficult endeavour. Mitigating explainable failures and understanding fundamental physical phenomena, that in turn reduce the scope for unexplainable failures, increases the chances of success in the ever-advancing field of space exploration.
