– could the space shuttle just fly into space like a plane, rather than being propelled vertically by rockets?

Question

– could the space shuttle just fly into space like a plane, rather than being propelled vertically by rockets?

In: 48

Answer 1

A fish needs water to swim, and a plane needs air to fly.

An aquatic animal can gain enough speed to breach the surface and glide for a while, and in theory a plane could go fast enough to “breach” our atmosphere and glide into space. But the animal cannot really swim in the air without water, and a plane can’t really “fly” (the way planes do) in space without air.

That’s probably about as far as you can take the analogy.

There are other posts that explain the mechanics of flight pretty well, but I just wanted to throw in a super-simple analogy to give a reader the beginnings of the idea and get them into the mindset to understand the deeper answers.