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Gravity Assist
Using the gravity and orbital speed of a celestial body to change speed and course of a spacecraft. (Read the full article)
| "Flandro gives the history of the gravity assist concept in the paper AIAA-2001-0176. He partially credits Cummings, but also notes earlier works. From the abstract: "Of more interest in the context of this paper is the realization that such
perturbations might be applied in spaceflight. This important notion can be traced to the science fiction
writers of the 1930's who recognized that if a comet orbit could be modified, why not that of a space
vehicle?"" (Geoffrey A. Landis 9/28/2005 11:59:03 AM ) |
| "The abstract further states "All of the basic mechanics were understood by D'Alembert as early as 1773; Laplace, Leverrier, and Tisserand employed them in understanding the perturbation of the motion of comets passing close to a planet. Of more interest in the context of this paper is the realization that such perturbations might be applied in spaceflight." I'm still looking for better citations, also I couldn't get access to this paper." (Bill Christensen 9/14/2014 1:17:55 PM ) |
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