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Rocket   /rˈɑkət/   Listen
noun
Rocket  n.  (Bot.)
(a)
A cruciferous plant (Eruca sativa) sometimes eaten in Europe as a salad.
(b)
Damewort.
(c)
Rocket larkspur. See below.
Dyer's Rocket. (Bot.) See Dyer's broom, under Broom.
Rocket larkspur (Bot.), an annual plant with showy flowers in long racemes (Delphinium Ajacis).
Sea rocket (Bot.), either of two fleshy cruciferous plants (Cakile maritima and Cakile Americana) found on the seashore of Europe and America.
Yellow rocket (Bot.), a common cruciferous weed with yellow flowers (Barbarea vulgaris).


Rocket  n.  
1.
An artificial firework consisting of a cylindrical case of paper or metal filled with a composition of combustible ingredients, as niter, charcoal, and sulphur, and fastened to a guiding stick. The rocket is projected through the air by the force arising from the expansion of the gases liberated by combustion of the composition. Rockets are used as projectiles for various purposes, for signals, and also for pyrotechnic display.
2.
A blunt lance head used in the joust.
3.
Any flying device propelled by the reactive force of hot gases expelled in the direction opposite its motion. The fuel used to generate the expelled gases in rockets may be solid or liquid; rockets propelled by liquid fuels typically have a combustible fuel (such as hydrogen or kerosene) which is combined inside the rocket engine with an oxidizer, such as liquid oxygen. Single liquid fuels (called monopropellants) are also known. Since rocket engines do not depend on a surrounding fluid medium to generate their thrust, as do airplanes with propellers or jet engines, they may be used for propulsion in the vacuum of space.
Congreve rocket, a powerful form of rocket for use in war, invented by Sir William Congreve. It may be used either in the field or for bombardment; in the former case, it is armed with shells or case shot; in the latter, with a combustible material inclosed in a metallic case, which is inextinguishable when kindled, and scatters its fire on every side.


verb
Rocket  v. i.  (past & past part. rocketed; pres. part. rocketing)  (Sporting) To rise straight up; said of birds; usually in the present participle or as an adjective. (Eng.) "An old cock pheasant came rocketing over me."





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Rocket" Quotes from Famous Books



... two hundred yards away. Beside him stood a singular erection made apparently of two rods. He bent over it and there was the flare of a light; all March's schoolboy memories woke in him, and he knew what it was. It was the stand of a rocket. The confused, incongruous memories still possessed him up to the very moment of a fierce but familiar sound; and an instant after the rocket left its perch and went up into endless space like a starry arrow aimed at the stars. March thought suddenly of the signs of the last days ...
— The Man Who Knew Too Much • G.K. Chesterton
... devised, both in the case of the lighthouse and of the ship's deck, to place the firing-point of the gun-cotton at a safe distance, no such arrangement could compete, as regards simplicity and effectiveness, with the expedient of a gun-cotton rocket. Had such a means of signalling existed at the Bishop's Rock lighthouse, the ill-fated 'Schiller' might have been warned of her approach to danger ten, or it may be twenty, miles before she reached the rock which wrecked her. Had the fleet possessed ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... Narrows, soared over Upper Bay, and came to rest over Jersey City in a position that dominated lower New York. There the monsters hung, large and wonderful in the evening light, serenely regardless of the occasional rocket explosions and flashing shell-bursts in ...
— The War in the Air • Herbert George Wells
... laughed at because he said he thought he could go thirty miles an hour, and was urged before the House of Commons not to say so, as he might be thought to be mad. This I have from person who knew the circumstances. Nevertheless, at the trial, I believe the "Rocket" did go at the rate of thirty miles an hour, to the not small astonishment of the world, and especially to the unbelievers in steam as a land agent. The stipulation made was that trains were to be conveyed at the rate of ...
— Lectures on Popular and Scientific Subjects • John Sutherland Sinclair, Earl of Caithness
... with a yell, rather than a cry, of delight, and in a voice so loud that the words were heard below, and flew through the ship like the hissing of an ascending rocket. To confirm the glorious tidings, the flash and roar of guns on the off-side of the stranger announced the welcome tidings that le Pluton had an enemy of her own to contend with, thus enabling the Plantagenet's people to throw all their strength on the ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper


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