Why do rockets fly into space? How do rockets fly? Description, photo and video. This is not vertical flight

What is a space rocket? How is it structured? How does it fly? Why do people travel in space on rockets?

It would seem that all this has been known to us for a long time and well. But let's check ourselves just in case. Let's repeat the alphabet.

Our planet Earth is covered with a layer of air - the atmosphere. At the surface of the Earth, the air is quite dense and thick. Higher it thins out. At an altitude of hundreds of kilometers, it imperceptibly “fades away” and passes into airless outer space.

Compared to the air in which we live, it is empty. But, speaking strictly scientifically, the emptiness is still not complete. All this space is penetrated by the rays of the Sun and stars, and fragments of atoms flying from them. Cosmic dust particles float in it. You may encounter a meteorite. In the vicinity of many celestial bodies, traces of their atmospheres are felt. Therefore, we cannot call airless outer space empty. We will simply call it space.

The same law of universal gravitation operates both on Earth and in space. According to this law, all objects attract each other. The pull of the huge globe is very noticeable.

To break away from the Earth and fly into space, you must first of all somehow overcome its gravity.

The plane overcomes it only partially. As it takes off, it rests its wings on the air. And it cannot rise to places where the air is very thin. Especially in space, where there is no air at all.

You cannot climb a tree higher than the tree itself.

What to do? How to “climb” into space? What can you rely on where there is nothing?

Let's imagine ourselves as huge giants. We are standing on the surface of the Earth, and the atmosphere is waist-deep. We have the ball in our hands. We release it from our hands - it flies down towards the Earth. Falls at our feet.

Now we throw the ball parallel to the surface of the Earth. Obeying us, the ball should fly above the atmosphere, forward, where we threw it. But the Earth did not stop pulling him towards itself. And, obeying her, he, like the first time, must fly down. The ball is forced to obey both. And therefore it flies somewhere in the middle between two directions, between “forward” and “down”. The path of the ball, its trajectory, is obtained in the form of a curved line bending towards the Earth. The ball descends, plunges into the atmosphere and falls to Earth. But no longer at our feet, but somewhere further away.

Let's throw the ball harder. He will fly faster. Under the influence of the Earth's gravity, it will begin to turn towards it again. But now it’s more hollow.

Let's throw the ball even harder. He flew so fast, began to turn so shallowly that he no longer had time to fall to Earth. Its surface “rounds” under him, as if leaving from under him. The trajectory of the ball, although it bends towards the Earth, is not steep enough. And it turns out that, while continuously falling towards the Earth, the ball nevertheless flies around the globe. Its trajectory closed into a ring and became an orbit. And the ball will now fly over it all the time. Without stopping falling towards the Earth. But without approaching it, without hitting it.

To put a ball into a circular orbit like this, you need to throw it at a speed of 8 kilometers per second! This speed is called circular, or first cosmic speed.

It is curious that this speed will be maintained by itself during flight. Flight slows down when something interferes with the flight. And nothing interferes with the ball. He flies above the atmosphere, in space!

How can you fly “by inertia” without stopping? This is difficult to understand because we have never lived in space. We are used to the fact that we are always surrounded by air. We know that a ball of cotton wool, no matter how hard you throw it, will not fly far, will get stuck in the air, stop, and fall to the Earth. In space, all objects fly without encountering resistance. At a speed of 8 kilometers per second, unfolded sheets of newspaper, cast iron weights, tiny cardboard toy rockets and real steel spaceships can fly nearby. Everyone will fly side by side, not lagging behind or overtaking each other. They will circle the Earth the same way.

But let's get back to the ball. Let's throw it even harder. For example, at a speed of 10 kilometers per second. What will happen to him?

Rocket orbits at different initial speeds.

At this speed, the trajectory will straighten out even more. The ball will begin to move away from the Earth. Then it will slow down and smoothly turn back towards Earth. And, approaching it, it will accelerate just to the speed at which we sent it flying, up to ten kilometers per second. At this speed he will rush past us and carry on further. Everything will repeat from the beginning. Again rise with deceleration, turn, fall with acceleration. This ball will also never fall to the ground. He also went into orbit. But no longer circular, but elliptical.

A ball thrown at a speed of 11.1 kilometers per second will “reach” the Moon itself and only then turn back. And at a speed of 11.2 kilometers per second, it will not return to Earth at all, it will go off to wander around the solar system. The speed of 11.2 kilometers per second is called the second cosmic speed.

So, you can stay in space only with the help of high speed.

How can one accelerate to at least the first cosmic speed, up to eight kilometers per second?

The speed of a car on a good highway does not exceed 40 meters per second. The speed of the TU-104 aircraft is no more than 250 meters per second. And we need to move at a speed of 8000 meters per second! Fly more than thirty times faster than an airplane! It is absolutely impossible to rush at such speed in the air. The air “does not let in.” He becomes an impenetrable wall on our path.

That is why we then, imagining ourselves as giants, “leaned out waist-deep” from the atmosphere into space. The air was bothering us.

But miracles don't happen. There are no giants. But you still need to “stick your head out.” What should I do? Building a tower hundreds of kilometers high is ridiculous to even think about. We need to find a way to slowly, “slowly,” pass through the thick air into space. And only where there is nothing stopping you from accelerating “on a good road” to the required speed.

In a word, to stay in space, you need to accelerate. And in order to accelerate, you must first get to space and stay there.

To hold on, speed up! To accelerate - hold on!

Our wonderful Russian scientist Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky once suggested a way out of this vicious circle to people. Only a rocket is suitable for going into space and accelerating into it. This is what our conversation will go on next.

The rocket has neither wings nor propellers. She can not rely on anything in flight. To accelerate, it does not need to push off from anything. It can move both in the air and in space. Slower in the air, faster in space. It moves in a reactive manner. What does it mean? Let's give an old but very good example.

The shore of a quiet lake. There is a boat two meters from the shore. The nose is pointed into the lake. There is a guy standing at the stern of the boat, wanting to jump ashore. He sat down, strained himself, jumped with all his might... and “landed” safely on the shore. And the boat... started moving and quietly floated away from the shore.

What happened? When the boy jumped, his legs worked like a spring, which was compressed and then straightened. This “spring” at one end pushed the man onto the shore. For others - a boat into the lake. The boat and the man pushed each other away. The boat floated, as they say, thanks to the recoil, or reaction. This is the reactive way of movement.

Diagram of a multistage rocket.

The return is well known to us. Remember, for example, how a cannon fires. When fired, the projectile flies forward from the barrel, while the gun itself rolls sharply back. Why? Yes, all for the same reason. The gunpowder inside the gun barrel, burning, turns into hot gases. Trying to escape, they press from the inside on all the walls, ready to tear the cannon barrel into pieces. They push out an artillery shell and, expanding, also work like a spring - they “throw the gun and the shell in different directions.” Only the projectile is lighter, and it can be thrown many kilometers away. The gun is heavier, and it can only be rolled back a little.

Now let's take an ordinary small gunpowder rocket, which has been used for fireworks for hundreds of years. This is a cardboard tube, closed on one side. There's gunpowder inside. If you set it on fire, it burns, turning into hot gases. Breaking out through the open end of the tube, they throw themselves back and the rocket forward. And they push her so hard that she flies towards the sky.

Gunpowder rockets have been around for a long time. But for large space rockets, gunpowder, it turns out, is not always convenient. First of all, gunpowder is not at all the most powerful explosive. Alcohol or kerosene, for example, if they are finely sprayed and mixed with droplets of liquid oxygen, explode more powerfully than gunpowder. Such liquids have a common name - fuel. And liquid oxygen or liquids that replace it, containing a lot of oxygen, are called an oxidizing agent. The fuel and oxidizer together form rocket fuel.

A modern liquid propellant rocket engine, or LRE for short, is a very durable, steel, bottle-shaped combustion chamber. Its neck with a bell is a nozzle. Fuel and oxidizer are continuously injected into the chamber through tubes in large quantities. Vigorous combustion occurs. The flames are raging. Hot gases burst out through the nozzle with incredible force and a loud roar. Breaking free, they push the camera in the opposite direction. The camera is attached to the rocket, and it turns out that the gases are pushing the rocket. The gas stream is directed backward, and therefore the rocket flies forward.

A modern large rocket looks like this. Below, in its tail, there are engines, one or more. Above, almost all the free space is occupied by fuel tanks. At the top, in the head of the rocket, is placed what it is flying for. That she must “deliver to the address.” In space rockets, this could be some kind of satellite that needs to be launched into orbit, or a spaceship with astronauts.

The rocket itself is called a launch vehicle. And a satellite or ship is a payload.

So, it’s as if we have found a way out of the vicious circle. We have a rocket with a liquid rocket engine. Moving in a reactive manner, it can “quietly” pass through the dense atmosphere, go into space and there accelerate to the required speed.

The first difficulty that rocket scientists encountered was a lack of fuel. Rocket engines are deliberately made to be very “gluttonous” so that they burn fuel faster, produce and throw back as many gases as possible. But... the rocket will not have time to gain even half the required speed before the fuel in the tanks runs out. And this despite the fact that we literally filled the entire inside of the rocket with fuel. Make the rocket bigger to fit more fuel? Will not help. Accelerating a larger, heavier rocket will take more fuel, and there will be no benefit.

Tsiolkovsky also suggested a way out of this unpleasant situation. He advised making multi-stage rockets.

We take several rockets of different sizes. They are called steps - first, second, third. We put one on top of the other. Below is the biggest one. Less for her. On top is the smallest one, with the payload in the head. This is a three-stage rocket. But there may be more steps.

During takeoff, the first, most powerful stage begins to accelerate. Having used up its fuel, it separates and falls back to Earth. The rocket gets rid of excess weight. The second stage begins to work, continuing acceleration. Its engines are smaller, lighter, and they consume fuel more economically. Having completed its work, the second stage also separates, passing the baton to the third. It’s already quite easy for that one. She finishes the acceleration.

All space rockets are multistage.

The next question is what is the best way for a rocket to go into space? Maybe, like an airplane, we can take off along a concrete path, take off from the Earth and, gradually gaining altitude, rise into airless space?

It is not profitable. You'll have to fly in the air for too long. The path through the dense layers of the atmosphere should be shortened as much as possible. Therefore, as you probably noticed, all space rockets, no matter where they fly later, always fly straight up. And only in thin air do they gradually turn in the right direction. This kind of takeoff is the most economical in terms of fuel consumption.

Multistage rockets launch payload into orbit. But at what cost? Judge for yourself. To put one ton into low-Earth orbit, you need to burn several tens of tons of fuel! For a load of 10 tons - hundreds of tons. The American Saturn 5 rocket, which launches 130 tons into low-Earth orbit, itself weighs 3,000 tons!

And perhaps the most distressing thing is that we still do not know how to return launch vehicles to Earth. Having done their job, accelerating the payload, they separate and... fall. They crash on the ground or drown in the ocean. We can't use them a second time.

Imagine if a passenger plane were built for only one flight. Incredible! But rockets, which cost more than airplanes, are built only for one flight. Therefore, launching each satellite or spacecraft into orbit is very expensive.

But we digress.

Our task is not always only to place the payload into a circular near-Earth orbit. Much more often a more complex task is given. For example, delivering a payload to the Moon. And sometimes bring her back from there. In this case, after entering a circular orbit, the rocket must perform many more different “maneuvers.” And they all require fuel consumption.

So now let's talk about these maneuvers.

The plane flies nose forward because it needs to cut the air with its sharp nose. But the rocket, after it has entered airless space, has nothing to cut. There is nothing in her way. And therefore, after turning off the engine, a rocket in space can fly in any position - both astern forward and tumbling. If the engine is briefly turned on again during such a flight, it will push the rocket. And here it all depends on where the nose of the rocket is aimed. If forward, the engine will push the rocket and it will fly faster. If it goes backwards, the engine will hold back, slow it down, and it will fly slower. If the rocket was pointing its nose to the side, the engine would push it to the side, and it would change the direction of its flight without changing speed.

The same engine can do anything with a rocket. Accelerate, brake, turn. It all depends on how we aim or orient the rocket before turning on the engine.

On the rocket, somewhere in the tail, there are small attitude control jet engines. They are directed with nozzles in different directions. By turning them on and off, you can push the tail of the rocket up and down, left and right, and thus rotate the rocket. Orient her nose in any direction.

Let's imagine that we need to fly to the moon and return. What maneuvers will this require?

First of all, we enter a circular orbit around the Earth. Here you can rest by turning off the engine. Without spending a single gram of precious fuel, the rocket will circle the Earth “silently” until we decide to fly further.

To get to the Moon, you need to switch from a circular orbit to a highly elongated elliptical one.

We orient the rocket nose forward and turn on the engine. He starts to disperse us. As soon as the speed slightly exceeds 11 kilometers per second, turn off the engine. The rocket went into a new orbit.

It must be said that it is very difficult to “hit the target” in space. If the Earth and Moon stood still, and it was possible to fly in space in straight lines, the matter would be simple. Take aim - and fly, keeping the target “on course” all the time, as captains of sea ships and pilots do. Speed ​​doesn't matter there either. You will arrive at the place earlier or later, what difference does it make? All the same, the goal, the “destination port,” will not go anywhere.

It's not like that in space. Getting from the Earth to the Moon is about the same as, spinning quickly on a merry-go-round, hitting a flying bird with a ball. Judge for yourself. The earth from which we take off rotates. The Moon - our “destination port” - also does not stand still, it flies around the Earth, flying a kilometer every second. In addition, our rocket does not fly in a straight line, but in an elliptical orbit, gradually slowing down its movement. Its speed only at the beginning was more than eleven kilometers per second, and then, due to the gravity of the Earth, it began to decrease. And the flight takes a long time, several days. And at the same time there are no landmarks around. There is no road. There is not and cannot be any map, because there would be nothing to put on the map - there is nothing around. One blackness. Only the stars are far, far away. They are above us and below us, from all sides. And we must calculate the direction of our flight and its speed in such a way that at the end of the journey we arrive at the intended place in space at the same time as the Moon. If we make a mistake in speed, we will be late for the “date”, the Moon will not wait for us.

In order to reach the goal, despite all these difficulties, there are the most complex instruments on the Earth and on the rocket. Electronic computers operate on Earth, hundreds of observers, computers, scientists and engineers work.

And despite all this, we still check once or twice along the way whether we are flying correctly. If we deviate a little, we carry out, as they say, a trajectory correction. To do this, we orient the rocket with its nose in the desired direction and turn on the engine for a few seconds. He will push the rocket a little and correct its flight. And then it flies as it should.

Approaching the Moon is also not easy. First, we need to fly as if we intend to “miss” the Moon. Secondly, fly “astern first”. As soon as the rocket reaches the Moon, we turn on the engine for a while. He slows us down. Under the influence of the Moon's gravity, we turn in its direction and begin to walk around it in a circular orbit. Here you can take a little rest again. Then we start planting. Again we orient the rocket “stern first” and once again briefly turn on the engine. The speed decreases and we begin to fall towards the Moon. Not far from the surface of the Moon, we turn on the engine again. He begins to break our fall. We need to calculate it in such a way that the engine completely reduces speed and stops us just before landing. Then we will gently, without impact, descend to the Moon.

The return from the Moon is already proceeding in a familiar manner. First, we take off into a circular, lunar orbit. Then we increase the speed and move to an elongated elliptical orbit, along which we go towards the Earth. But landing on Earth is different from landing on the Moon. The earth is surrounded by an atmosphere, and air resistance can be used to brake.

However, it is impossible to crash vertically into the atmosphere. If the braking is too sharp, the rocket will burst into flames, burn out, and fall to pieces. Therefore, we aim it so that it enters the atmosphere at random. In this case, it does not sink into the dense layers of the atmosphere so quickly. Our speed decreases smoothly. At an altitude of several kilometers, the parachute opens - and we are home. That's how many maneuvers a flight to the Moon requires.

To save fuel, designers use multi-stage technology here too. For example, our rockets, which softly landed on the Moon and then brought back samples of lunar soil, had five stages. Three - for takeoff from Earth and flight to the Moon. The fourth is for landing on the Moon. And the fifth - for returning to Earth.

Everything we have said so far has been, so to speak, theory. Now let's take a mental excursion to the cosmodrome. Let's see how this all looks in practice.

They build rockets in factories. Wherever possible, the lightest and most durable materials are used. To make the rocket lighter, they try to make all its mechanisms and all the equipment on it as “portable” as possible. The rocket will be lighter - you can take more fuel with you, increase the payload.

The rocket is brought to the cosmodrome in parts. It is assembled in a large installation and testing building. Then a special crane - the installer - in a lying position carries the rocket, empty, without fuel, to the launch pad. There he lifts her and puts her in an upright position. The rocket is surrounded on all sides by four supports of the launch system so that it does not fall from gusts of wind. Then service farms with balconies are brought to it, so that the technicians preparing the rocket for launch can get close to any place. A refueling mast with hoses through which fuel is poured into the rocket, and a cable mast with electrical cables are brought in to check all the mechanisms and instruments of the rocket before the flight.

Space rockets are huge. Our very first space rocket, Vostok, was 38 meters high, about the size of a ten-story building. And the largest American six-stage rocket, Saturn 5, which carried American astronauts to the Moon, had a height of more than one hundred meters. Its diameter at the base is 10 meters.

When everything is checked and fuel filling is completed, the service trusses, refueling mast and cable mast are removed.

And here's the start! Upon a signal from the command post, the automation begins to work. It supplies fuel to the combustion chambers. Turns on the ignition. The fuel ignites. The engines begin to quickly gain power, putting more and more pressure on the rocket from below. When they finally gain full power and lift the rocket, the supports fold back, release the rocket, and with a deafening roar, as if on a pillar of fire, it goes into the sky.

The rocket's flight is controlled partly automatically, partly by radio from the Earth. And if the rocket carries a spaceship with astronauts, then they themselves can control it.

To communicate with the rocket, radio stations are located around the globe. After all, the rocket is orbiting the planet, and it may be necessary to contact it just when it is “on the other side of the Earth.”

Rocket technology, despite its youth, shows us miracles of perfection. Rockets flew to the moon and returned back. They flew hundreds of millions of kilometers to Venus and Mars, making soft landings there. Manned spacecraft performed complex maneuvers in space. Hundreds of various satellites have been launched into space by rockets.

There are many difficulties on the paths leading into space.

For a human journey, say, to Mars, we would need a rocket of absolutely incredible, monstrous dimensions. More grandiose ocean ships weighing tens of thousands of tons! There is nothing to even think about building such a rocket.

At first, when flying to nearby planets, docking in space can help. Huge “long-distance” spaceships can be built dismountable, from individual links. Using relatively small rockets, launch these links into the same “assembly” orbit near the Earth and dock there. So you can assemble a ship in space that will be even larger than the rockets that lifted it into space piece by piece. Technically this is possible even today.

However, docking does not make the conquest of space much easier. Much more will come from the development of new rocket engines. Also reactive, but less voracious than the current liquid ones. Visiting the planets of our solar system will move forward sharply after the development of electric and atomic engines. However, the time will come when flights to other stars, to other solar systems will become necessary. And then new technology will again be required. Perhaps by then scientists and engineers will be able to build photon rockets. With a “Fire Jet” they will have an incredibly powerful beam of light. With an insignificant consumption of substance, such rockets can accelerate to speeds of hundreds of thousands of kilometers per second!

Space technology will never stop developing. A person will set himself more and more new goals. To achieve them, we need to come up with more and more advanced rockets. And having created them, set even more majestic goals!

Many of you guys will probably devote yourselves to conquering space. Good luck to you on this interesting path!

And we know that for movement to occur, some force must be applied. The body either itself must push off from something, or a third-party body must push the given one. This is well known and understandable to us from life experience.

What to push off from in space?

At the surface of the Earth, you can push off from the surface or from objects on it. To move on the surface, they use legs, wheels, tracks, and so on. In water and air, you can push away from the water and air themselves, which have a certain density and therefore allow you to interact with them. Nature has adapted fins and wings for this purpose.

Man has created engines based on propellers, which greatly increase the area of ​​contact with the environment due to rotation and allow them to push off water and air. But what about the case of airless space? What to start from in space? There is no air there, there is nothing there. How to fly in space? This is where the law of conservation of momentum and the principle of reactive propulsion come to the rescue. Let's take a closer look.

Impulse and the principle of jet propulsion

Momentum is the product of a body's mass and its speed. When a body is motionless, its speed is zero. However, the body has some mass. In the absence of external influences, if part of the mass is separated from the body at a certain speed, then, according to the law of conservation of momentum, the rest of the body must also acquire a certain speed so that the total momentum remains equal to zero.

Moreover, the speed of the remaining main part of the body will depend on the speed with which the smaller part separates. The higher this speed is, the higher the speed of the main body will be. This is understandable if we recall the behavior of bodies on ice or in water.

If two people are nearby, and then one of them pushes the other, then he will not only give him acceleration, but will also fly back. And the harder he pushes someone, the faster he will fly away.

Surely, you have been in a similar situation, and you can imagine how this happens. So, this is what jet propulsion is based on.

Rockets that implement this principle eject some of their mass at high speed, as a result of which they themselves acquire some acceleration in the opposite direction.

Streams of hot gases resulting from fuel combustion are ejected through narrow nozzles to give them maximum speed. At the same time, the mass of the rocket decreases by the amount of the mass of these gases, and it acquires a certain speed. This is how the principle of reactive motion in physics is realized.

Rocket flight principle

Rockets use a multi-stage system. During flight, the lower stage, having used up its entire fuel supply, is separated from the rocket to reduce its overall mass and facilitate flight.

The number of stages decreases until the working part remains in the form of a satellite or other spacecraft. The fuel is calculated in such a way that it is enough to enter orbit.

As you know, the rocket is still the fastest transport on planet Earth. The rocket has an unusual engine, which is called a jet engine. Before a rocket takes off, its huge tanks are filled with rocket fuel. When starting, the fuel ignites, which when burned turns into hot gas. This gas rushes out through the nozzle (a nozzle is a narrow hole located at the bottom of the rocket) with great speed and force.

A powerful jet of gas hits in one direction, and the rocket, due to its repelling effect, flies in the opposite direction.

All the cargo is located at the very top of this multi-stage rocket. The upper part is covered with a special flowing cap, which is called the head fairing. Each stage is an independent rocket, with fuel tanks inside and engines in the tail.

At the start, the lowest and very powerful one is turned on, whose responsibility is to lift all the weight through the layers of the atmosphere. When the fuel in it burns completely, the lower stage is automatically disconnected as a no longer needed element and the engine of the second stage, the rocket, begins to operate. The rocket accelerates faster and faster.

And when it ends in the second middle stage, the engine of the uppermost launch vehicle is turned on, and the lower stage is also disconnected. Finally, it accelerates to the first escape velocity and enters the earth's orbit, where it is already moving independently.

The steps that have fallen off do not; due to friction with the atmosphere, they become heated to such an extent that they completely burn out. The launch vehicle itself, the spacecraft, is divided into two parts: the descent module and the instrument compartment. The descent module contains astronauts who work, rest and sleep there.

And in the instrument compartment there is a braking propulsion system, with the help of which the ship returns to the ground. There are also instruments with which astronauts conduct research.

A rocket is a means of human transportation in the air, in the atmosphere. Airplanes and other flying machines also serve to fly. But they are each other...

A rocket is a means of transporting a person in the air, in the atmosphere.. Airplanes and other flying machines also serve to fly. But they are different from each other. The rocket takes off, planes and vehicles fly. But the laws of flight are different. The rocket looks more like a large projectile fired into the air. The rocket is designed to fly into space. And it takes off due to jet thrust.

How does the rocket move? Due to jet thrust.
Can she fly in more than just air? Maybe. She can even fly in a vacuum. There is no air in space, but the rocket nevertheless flies. And even better than in the air.

The rocket flight system works according to Newton's law. The gases in the engine are accelerated, creating thrust, which creates force. With the help of this force the rocket moves. To move, you need to push off from something. When a car drives or a person walks, they push off from the earth's surface and fall back onto it. The result is forward movement, since the Earth's gravitational force acts. The rocket rises into space, but does not fall back. With the help of reactive gases, it is repelled from the Earth, but does not return back, overcoming the traction force. Water bodies operate in approximately the same way: a submarine, a squid, a shark swim.

A variety of fuels are used to make a rocket take off. It can be liquid or solid. By burning fuel, the rocket rises into the air. After the fuel combustion chamber there are nozzles. Burnt gas erupts from them, which lifts the rocket into space. A rocket rising upward can be compared to an erupting volcano. When it flies into the air, you can observe large clouds of smoke, a burning smell, and fire. Just like a volcano or a big explosion.

The rocket consists of several stages. As its flight progresses, these stages separate. In space itself, already much easier, a spaceship is flying, which has thrown out all the extra cargo, what was a rocket.

Step separation example

It should be noted that the plane cannot fly into space. Balloon too. Of all the known means of air travel, the rocket is the only one that rises into space and can fly beyond the planet Earth.

This is interesting: The rocket is not the most famous aircraft today. It is known that vimanas once flew in space. The principle of flight is reminiscent of the flight of today's rocket. The top of the rocket resembles a vimana, but it is of a slightly different shape.

How and why a rocket takes off

In order to see how a rocket takes off, you need to watch special television reports or find relevant videos on the Internet. Only certain individuals involved in this process can become direct witnesses to the takeoff and see with their own eyes from a short distance where the vehicle is heading, and they must be on the territory of the cosmodrome.

How does takeoff happen?

The spacecraft cannot launch on its own; to do this, it needs to receive a command from the control center. The rocket is in a vertical position at the spaceport, then the engines begin to make a powerful sound. First, a bright flame of impressive size appears below, and a growing roar is heard. Then this rocket flies up: first at a relatively low speed, then faster. With every second it moves further and further from the Earth, the sound becomes stronger.

Pretty soon the spacecraft is located at an altitude that both civilian and combat aircraft are unable to reach. Only devices designed to operate in the vastness of the Universe, located outside the boundaries of the atmospheres of celestial bodies, fly at such an altitude. Literally a minute later, the take-off vehicle finds itself in space, that is, in airless space. Then he continues his journey depending on the route that was planned on Earth. This device, as before, is controlled from the command post.

Jet engines

The sound a rocket makes when taking off indicates that it is equipped with jet engines. The motors are driven by the force that arises as a result of the appearance of a powerful jet of hot gases. These gases are formed in a special chamber when fuel burns. It may seem incredible that they have the ability to easily launch a rocket weighing several tons into space orbit, while the characteristic sound is heard at a fairly large distance from the launch site.

At the same time, it should be borne in mind that the air contained in the chambers of bicycles or cars successfully withstands the mass of both people driving two-wheeled vehicles and drivers of cars, as well as their passengers and cargo. Therefore, it is not surprising that extremely hot gas, escaping from the rocket nozzle with enormous force, is capable of pushing it upward at high speed. After almost every rocket launch, the launch site, built using especially durable materials, needs to be repaired, because rockets should not take off from a damaged surface.

Newton's third law

We are talking about a law, which means the law of conservation of momentum. Initially, the rocket, stationary on the launch pad before launch, has a momentum of zero. After turning on the engines, the sound increases; when fuel burns, high-temperature gaseous products are formed, which escape from the nozzle of the aircraft at high speed. This results in the creation of an impulse vector that is directed downward.

However, there is a law of conservation of momentum, according to which the total momentum acquired by the take-off vehicle relative to the launch pad must still be zero. Here another impulse vector arises, the action of which is aimed at balancing the product in relation to the exhaust gases. It appears due to the fact that the spacecraft, which was standing still, begins to move. The upward impulse is equal to the weight of the product multiplied by its speed.

If the rocket's engines are powerful enough, it picks up speed quickly. This speed is enough to put a spacecraft into low-Earth orbit for a fairly short time. The take-off vehicle has power that directly depends on the fuel loaded into it. During the Soviet period, rocket engines ran on aviation kerosene. Currently, a more complex chemical mixture is used, which releases enormous amounts of energy when burned.

Rocket engines emitting flames propel the spacecraft into orbit around the Earth. Other rockets take ships beyond the solar system.

In any case, when we think about rockets, we imagine space flights. But rockets can also fly in your room, for example during your birthday celebration.

An ordinary balloon can also be a rocket. How? Inflate the balloon and pinch its neck to prevent air from escaping. Now release the ball. He will begin to fly around the room completely unpredictably and uncontrollably, pushed by the force of the air escaping from him.

Here's another simple rocket. Let's put a cannon on the railway car. Let's send her back. Let's assume that the friction between the rails and wheels is very small and the braking will be minimal. Let's fire a cannon. At the moment of the shot, the trolley moves forward. If you start shooting frequently, the trolley will not stop, but will pick up speed with each shot. Flying backwards from the cannon barrel, the shells push the trolley forward.

The force that is created in this case is called recoil. It is this force that makes any rocket move, both on earth and in space. Whatever substances or objects are ejected from a moving object, pushing it forward, we will have a sample of a rocket engine.

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The rocket is much better suited for flying in the void of space than in the earth's atmosphere. To launch a rocket into space, engineers have to design powerful rocket engines. They base their designs on the universal laws of the universe discovered by the great English scientist Isaac Newton, who worked at the end of the 17th century. Newton's laws describe gravity and what happens to physical bodies when they move. The second and third laws help to clearly understand what a rocket is.

Rocket motion and Newton's laws

Newton's second law relates the force of a moving object to its mass and acceleration (the change in speed per unit time). Thus, to create a powerful rocket, its engine must eject large masses of burned fuel at high speed. Newton's third law states that the action force is equal to the reaction force and is directed in the opposite direction. In the case of a rocket, the action force is the hot gases escaping from the rocket nozzle; the counterforce pushes the rocket forward.

Rockets that launch spacecraft into orbit use hot gases as a source of power. But the role of gases can be played by anything, that is, from solid bodies thrown into space from the stern to elementary particles - protons, electrons, photons.

What makes a rocket fly?

Many people think that a rocket moves because the gases ejected from the nozzle are repelled by the air. But that's not true. It is the force that ejects the gas from the nozzle that pushes the rocket into space. Indeed, it is easier for a rocket to fly in outer space, where there is no air, and nothing limits the flight of gas particles ejected by the rocket, and the faster these particles spread, the faster the rocket flies.