Sign In
Learn bits
Science & Tech.
Pradeep Kumar

12/07/21 13:20 PM IST

Suborbital flight

In news

Virgin Group founder Richard Branson and five others undertook a brief trip to the “edge of space”, taking off on the VSS Unity spaceship from New Mexico and reaching an altitude of 85 km from Earth before returning.

Suborbital
  • When an object travels at a horizontal speed of about 28,000 km/hr or more, it goes into orbit once it is above the atmosphere.
  • Satellites need to reach that threshold speed in order to do orbit Earth.
  • Such a satellite would accelerating toward the Earth due to gravity.
  • However, it moves fast enough that the Earth curves out from under it as fast as it falls, giving it a circular path, the Virginia Commonwealth University explains on its website.
  • Any object travelling slower than 28,000 km/hr must eventually return to Earth. However, Branson’s spacecraft travelled fast enough, as Bezos’s will, to reach a point far enough to be considered outer space.
  • These are suborbital flights, because they will not be traveling fast enough to orbit Earth once they reach the “edge of space”.
  • Such a trip allows space travellers to experience a few minutes of “weightlessness”.
Source: Indian Express

More Related Current Affairs View All

20 Nov

ISRO’s GSAT-N2 communication satellite

'Elon Musk-owned Space X successfully launched the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)'s communication satellite GSAT-N2 from Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.'

Read More

20 Nov

Artificial rain in New Delhi

'As the national capital’s air quality continued to be in the ‘severe plus’ category for the third consecutive day, Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai wrote to

Read More

20 Nov

Chancay port project in Peru

'Chinese President Xi Jinping inaugurated Peru’s Chancay Port  describing it as the starting point for a “new land-sea corridor between China and Latin America&rdq

Read More

India’s First Ai-Driven Magazine Generator

Generate Your Custom Current Affairs Magazine using our AI in just 3 steps