Spacelaunch
Space launch is the earliest part of a flight that reaches space. Space launch involves liftoff, when a rocket or other space launch vehicle leaves the ground, floating ship or midair aircraft at the start of a flight. Liftoff is of two main types: rocket launch (the current conventional method), and non-rocket spacelaunch (where other forms of propulsion are employed, including airbreathing jet engines or other kinds). Issues with reaching space Definition of outer space Energy Therefore, by definition for spaceflight to occur, sufficient altitude is necessary. This implies a minimum gravitational potential energy needs to be overcome: for the Kármán line this is approximately 1 MJ/kg. W=mgh, m=1 kg, g=9.82 m/s2, h=105m. W=1*9.82*105≈106J/kg=1MJ/kg In practice, a higher energy than this is needed to be expended due to losses such as airdrag, propulsive efficiency, cycle efficiency of engines that are employed and gravity drag. In the past fifty years spacefl ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Non-rocket Spacelaunch
Non-rocket spacelaunch refers to theoretical concepts for launch into space where much of the speed and altitude needed to achieve orbit is provided by a propulsion technique that is not subject to the limits of the rocket equation. Although all space lauches to date have been rockets, a number of alternatives to rockets have been proposed. In some systems, such as a combination launch system, skyhook, rocket sled launch, rockoon, or air launch, a portion of the total delta-v may be provided, either directly or indirectly, by using rocket propulsion. Present-day launch costs are very high – $2,500 to $25,000 per kilogram from Earth to low Earth orbit (LEO). As a result, launch costs are a large percentage of the cost of all space endeavors. If launch can be made cheaper, the total cost of space missions will be reduced. Due to the exponential nature of the rocket equation, providing even a small amount of the velocity to LEO by other means has the potential of greatly red ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Spaceflight
Spaceflight (or space flight) is an application of astronautics to fly spacecraft into or through outer space, either with or without humans on board. Most spaceflight is uncrewed and conducted mainly with spacecraft such as satellites in orbit around Earth, but also includes space probes for flights beyond Earth orbit. Such spaceflight operates either by telerobotic or autonomous control. The more complex human spaceflight has been pursued soon after the first orbital satellites and has reached the Moon and permanent human presence in space around Earth, particularly with the use of space stations. Human spaceflight programs include the Soyuz, Shenzhou, the past Apollo Moon landing and the Space Shuttle programs, with currently the International Space Station as the main destination of human spaceflight missions while China's Tiangong Space Station is under construction. Spaceflight is used for placing in Earth's orbit communications satellites, reconnaissance sat ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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ArianeGroup
ArianeGroup (formerly Airbus Safran Launchers) is an aerospace company based in France. A joint venture between Airbus and Safran, the company was founded in 2015 and is headquartered in Issy-les-Moulineaux. It consists of three core arms: aerospace, defence and security. ArianeGroup is currently developing its next-generation two-stage Ariane 6 launch vehicle, intended to succeed the Ariane 5 rocket, which has been launched more than 110 times. The new vehicle will be offered in two variants that will be capable of carrying between 10,350 and 21,650 kilograms. The first launch of Ariane 6 is expected to occur in 2023. If the company's task is to develop and manufacture the launch vehicles, Arianespace acts as the launch service provider for them. Meanwhile, another subsidiary, ArianeWorks, is tasked with developing next-generation technologies like the reusable Themis rocket booster. ArianeGroup also notably manufactures France's M51 nuclear submarine-launched ballistic miss ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rocket Launch
A rocket (from it, rocchetto, , bobbin/spool) is a vehicle that uses jet propulsion to accelerate without using the surrounding air. A rocket engine produces thrust by reaction to exhaust expelled at high speed. Rocket engines work entirely from propellant carried within the vehicle; therefore a rocket can fly in the vacuum of space. Rockets work more efficiently in a vacuum and incur a loss of thrust due to the opposing pressure of the atmosphere. Multistage rockets are capable of attaining escape velocity from Earth and therefore can achieve unlimited maximum altitude. Compared with airbreathing engines, rockets are lightweight and powerful and capable of generating large accelerations. To control their flight, rockets rely on momentum, airfoils, auxiliary reaction engines, gimballed thrust, momentum wheels, deflection of the exhaust stream, propellant flow, spin, or gravity. Rockets for military and recreational uses date back to at least 13th-century China. ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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SpaceX Crew Dragon (More Cropped)
Dragon 2 is a class of partially reusable spacecraft developed and manufactured by American aerospace manufacturer SpaceX, primarily for flights to the International Space Station (ISS). SpaceX has also launched private missions such as Inspiration4 and Axiom Mission 1. There are two variants: Crew Dragon, a spacecraft capable of ferrying four crew, and Cargo Dragon, an updated replacement for the original Dragon 1. The spacecraft consists of a reuseable space capsule and an expendable trunk module. The spacecraft launches atop a Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket and the capsule returns to Earth via splashdown. Cargo Dragon supplies cargo to the ISS under a Commercial Resupply Services-2 contract with NASA. The first flight of Dragon 2 in a cargo configuration launched in December 2020. It shares this duty with Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems' Cygnus spacecraft, and Sierra Nevada Corporation's Dream Chaser spacecraft is expected to join them . , Crew Dragon is the only U.S ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Orbex
Orbital Express Launch Ltd., or Orbex, is a United Kingdom-based aerospace company that is developing a small commercial orbital rocket called Prime. Orbex is headquartered in Forres, Moray, in Scotland and has subsidiaries in Denmark and Germany. Its future launch complex is proposed to be built on the A' Mhòine peninsula in the county of Sutherland, northern Scotland. Overview The company was founded in 2015 as Moonspike Ltd., with the goal of crowdfunding a private spacecraft mission to the moon. A Kickstarter campaign running from 1 October to 1 November 2015 raised less than £79,000 ($122,000) out of a goal of £600,000 ($925,000), rendering Moonspike ineligible for the funds. Moonspike was renamed Orbital Express Launch Ltd. in 2016, with the company now aiming to provide commercial launch services of nano- and microsatellites, especially CubeSats, to polar and sun-synchronous low Earth orbits. In July 2018, Orbex secured £30 million ($39.6 million) in public and privat ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rocket Propellant
Rocket propellant is the reaction mass of a rocket. This reaction mass is ejected at the highest achievable velocity from a rocket engine to produce thrust. The energy required can either come from the propellants themselves, as with a chemical rocket, or from an external source, as with ion engines. Overview Rockets create thrust by expelling mass rear-ward, at high velocity. The thrust produced can be calculated by multiplying the mass flow rate of the propellants by their exhaust velocity relative to the rocket (specific impulse). A rocket can be thought of as being accelerated by the pressure of the combusting gases against the combustion chamber and nozzle, not by "pushing" against the air behind or below it. Rocket engines perform best in outer space because of the lack of air pressure on the outside of the engine. In space it is also possible to fit a longer nozzle without suffering from flow separation. Most chemical propellants release energy through redox chemistry, m ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Space Gun
{{disambiguation ...
Space Gun may refer to: * Space gun, a method of launching an object into space * ''Space Gun'' (album), a 2018 album by Guided by Voices * ''Space Gun'' (video game), a 1990 arcade game * Ljutic Space Gun, a 12 gauge single-shot shotgun See also * Hand-Held Maneuvering Unit, or maneuvering gun or zip gun, a device used in spacewalks * Raygun, a science-fiction directed-energy weapon * TP-82 Cosmonaut survival pistol, carried by cosmonauts on space missions * Space warfare and space weapons Space weapons are weapons used in space warfare. They include weapons that can attack space systems in orbit (i.e. anti-satellite weapons), attack targets on the earth from space or disable missiles travelling through space. In the course of the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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SpaceLiner
SpaceLiner is a concept for a suborbital, hypersonic, winged passenger supersonic transport, conceived at the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt, or DLR) in 2005. In its second role the SpaceLiner is intended as a reusable launch vehicle (RLV) capable of delivering heavy payloads into orbit. The SpaceLiner is a very long-term project, and does not currently have funding lined up to initiate system development as of 2017. Projections in 2015 were that if adequate funding was eventually secured, the SpaceLiner concept might become an operational spaceplane in the 2040s. Concept The SpaceLiner concept consists of a two-stage, vertical takeoff, horizontal landing configuration with a large uncrewed booster and a crewed stage designed for 50 passengers and 2 crew members. The fully reusable system is accelerated by a total of eleven liquid rocket engines (9 for the booster stage, 2 for the passenger stage), which are to be operated using cryogenic ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Virgin Galactic
Virgin Galactic is an American spaceflight company founded by Richard Branson and his British Virgin Group retains an 11.9% stake through Virgin Investments Limited. It is headquartered in California, and operates from New Mexico. The company is developing commercial spacecraft and aims to provide suborbital spaceflights to space tourists. Virgin Galactic's suborbital spacecraft are air launched from beneath a carrier airplane known as White Knight Two. Virgin Galactic‘s maiden spaceflight occurred in 2018 with its VSS ''Unity'' spaceship. Branson had originally hoped to see a maiden spaceflight by 2010, but the date was delayed for several years, primarily due to the October 2014 crash of VSS ''Enterprise''. The company did the early work on the satellite launch development of LauncherOne before this was hived off to a separate company, Virgin Orbit, in 2017. The company also has aspirations for suborbital transport and in 2017, Branson has said that Virgin Galacti ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Gravity Drag
In astrodynamics and rocketry, gravity loss is a measure of the loss in the net performance of a rocket while it is thrusting in a gravitational field In physics, a gravitational field is a model used to explain the influences that a massive body extends into the space around itself, producing a force on another massive body. Thus, a gravitational field is used to explain gravitational phenome .... In other words, it is the cost of having to hold the rocket up in a gravity field. Gravity losses depend on the time over which thrust is applied as well the direction the thrust is applied in. Gravity losses as a proportion of delta-v are minimised if maximum thrust is applied for a short time, or if thrust is applied in a direction perpendicular to the local gravitational field. During the launch and ascent phase, however, thrust must be applied over a long period with a major component of thrust in the opposite direction to gravity, so gravity losses become significant. For exam ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |