9mo ago

NASA landed on the moon, by shooting for the moon

14 comments

You actually have to shoot for where the moon will be
- Actually you shoot horizontally along Earth's equator, to increase your orbital speed until your apoapsis intersects the lunar sphere of gravitational influence, at just the right moment for the moon to catch you.
  
  Well yeah, but I was trying to stick to the wording of the shower thought. We've all played Kerbal Space Program
- I mean you only have to shoot to where it will be half way, moon will take care of the rest
And if they'd done the math wrong, they'd have landed among the stars.
- Not if you make a free return trajectory.
- That's not how orbital mechanics work
  
  You're not how orbital mechanics work.
  
  Hush!
- Actually, they DID do the math wrong once......landed in the Ocean on earth. They just had to say "Ok.....lets go back home."
  Tom Hanks was in a movie about it that got a LOT of facts wrong.
  
  Land in ocean, suddenly Tom Hanks is involved.
  See? They still landed amongst the stars.
- Works in general: do the maths wrong, then the solution is wrong, too.

14 comments