12yo M’sian student creates history at World Robotics Championship

12-year-old Malaysian student, Danish Irfan Muslim became the youngest winner at the World Robotics Championship 2019 held in New Delhi, India. The Standard 6 student from SK Tun Hussein Onn in Kuala Lumpur teamed up with his father, Muslim Tamsir to beat 30 other teams comprising students from secondary schools, colleges and universities.

Danish who won the Water Rocket Challenge displayed great skills in building and launching water rockets using two-litre soft drink bottles. This is his first international contest after previously winning water rocket championships in 2018 and 2019 in Malaysia.

His father and teammate, 38-year-old Muslim Tamsir who also teaches the subjects of Science and Information Technology and Telecommunications at the same school said his eldest son was quite calm and very focused during the competition despite being surrounded by elder participants.

The father-son team participated in the 3-day championship without any corporate sponsorship or outside financial help which took place at New Delhi’s Thyagaraj Stadium.

“The competition was very tough, and on the second day, our water rocket had to be launched twice and recorded quite an unsatisfying time, but it seemed luck was on our side when we still managed to finish in the top 10 on the third day of the championship. In the final match, we were only allowed to launch a rocket once, but before that, we could do three trials. At the time we only had two rockets, but luckily we brought some spare parts for another rocket and another nose cone.Unexpectedly, the third rocket we fixed and launched ad-hoc stayed in the air the longest, for about 11 seconds,” Muslim told Bernama.

“We came to India to gain experience and play for fun. But having won the contest, we feel elated and proud as Malaysians. I also tell him that the main purpose of entering any competition is to gain experience and more knowledge on what he is interested in (rockets), and if we win, it would be a bonus, although so far in all competitions, we have not gone home empty-handed,” he added.