Since ancient times, man has been paying close attention to heaven in order to understand the structure of the universe, to find out its laws, to find out the location of bodies. It goes without saying that the knowledge of the upper layers of the Earth’s atmosphere and especially about outer space was very weak for a certain time in the human race. But everything changed in the XX century, when technological progress began to move forward, as they say, by leaps and bounds. We will talk in detail about the achievements of the space industry and rocket science in this article.
Pioneer
The first launch of a rocket with Yuri Gagarin on board changed our history, dividing it into entire eras. On April 12, 1961, a Russian officer for the first time on the planet flew into space.
The spacecraft launched from Baikonur at about nine in the morning Moscow time. As a result, the rocket made one revolution around the planet and completed a planned landing at 10:55, near the village of Smelovka, located in the Saratov region. The successful launch was the crown of the long and laborious work of a whole team of engineers and other specialists of the Soviet Union.
Space launches
Few people know, but even before Gagarin’s flight into space, the USSR launched the R-7 rocket in 1957. Thanks to this, the country of the Soviets won the principal space race against the United States. In turn, the Americans sent their missile into the airless space on January 31, 1958. The start took place on the American Cape Canaveral.
This was followed by rocket launches in Japan (1970), China (1970), Great Britain (1971), India (1980), Israel (1988), Russia (1992), Ukraine (1995), Iran (2009) year), DPRK (2012), South Korea (2013).
Launch features
The launch of a rocket into space should be carried out with the lowest possible energy costs. The most optimal from the point of view of speeding up a rocket are such cosmodromes: the European Kourou, the Brazilian Alcantra and the floating Sea Launch, which is capable of launching directly from the equatorial line of the Earth.
Why are the best missile launches coming from the equator? That's because, in this case, the device will immediately receive its speed of 465 m / s in the east. Such indicators are determined by the rotation of our planet. That is why, most often, missile launch trajectories are laid in the east direction. Israel can only be considered an exception, since in the east it is adjacent to extremely unfriendly states and therefore is forced to launch in the opposite direction (to the west).
History reference
Space technology was used by the Third Reich, which used it as an opportunity to circumvent the Treaty of Versailles. Before the start of World War II, the Germans developed the V-2. This type of missile was launched against Antwerp and London. It was she who turned out to be the first heavy rocket manned on the planet.
Time has shown that V-2 in the end turned out to be an erroneous project from the point of view of the military and economists. However, its historical value lies in the fact that thanks to it, army specialists from the USA and the USSR were able to verify the high potential of rocket technology, which manifested itself in the difficulty of detecting and intercepting the missile itself during its flight. And therefore, after the victory over the fascists from Germany, all production secrets and documentation were taken out, which served as the impetus for the start of the space race between the Soviets and the Western world.
Flight process
The launch of a space rocket today provides for its launch into Earth orbit. To achieve it, the spacecraft will need to be able to reach the first space velocity in the horizontal direction (7.9 km / s) at the lowest possible height. If this indicator is achieved, then in this case the rocket becomes an artificial satellite of our planet. If the speed is less than the specified value, then the resulting trajectory of the rocket will be considered ballistic.
To achieve the magnitude of the first space velocity in launch vehicles, the principle of multistage is used. The rocket itself takes off from a specially designed launch pad.
2015 world leader
In 2015, the launch into space of rockets from Russia was extremely successful. Over the past year, the Russian Federation made 26 launches of spacecraft, which allowed it to take an unconditional first place in the world. Russia accounted for 30% of all space launches on the planet. At the same time, the main launch sites were the Baikonur and Plesetsk cosmodromes.
