when something falls out of the sky, such as fairings from a falcon9
launch, could their light weight and aerodynamic properties result in
their trajectory making them appear to be floating in the sky, or would
in all circumstances and from all angles be very obvious that they are falling vertically or only slight diagonal trajectory due to wind? (at
least from altitudes reacheable by helicopters).
Apart form fairings, would there be other objects that would survive
re-entry AND be light enough to "parachute" down slowly?
For the Shuttle, from what I gather, the ET was jettisoed about 7581m/s
or 27,000kmh which is at or near orbital speed, but at altitude of
105km. It apparently made it from Kennedy to the Indian Ocean, so
roughly half an orbit. (which is quite different from Falcon9 whose bits
fall near KSC).
Since the ET made it to 105km altitude at near orbital speed without
burning up, how come it burns up on the way down? (or did it?).
Once
empty, I would assume that atmospheric drag would slow it down such that
it would end up going through atmosphere at lower speed than when it was being pushed by 3 SSMEs on the way up at same altitude.
Do we know that the ETs burned up, or could there be a big pile of
intact ETs sitting at bottom of the Indian Ocean?
Yes, they all tumbled and broke up.
Do we know that the ETs burned up, or could there be a big pile of
intact ETs sitting at bottom of the Indian Ocean?
Yes, they all tumbled and broke up.
Jeff
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