How did we land back on earth from the moon

984 viewsOtherPlanetary Science

Wouldn’t when we land on the moon, the earth would still be in motion bc of the orbit, and so whenever we exit the orbit of the moon (Which was orbiting the earth) the earth would still be in a constant orbit moving at high speeds, how did we calculate and intercept earth in said orbit.

In: Planetary Science

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Anonymous 0 Comments

The Earth is spinning around really fast (once a day on its own axis). And it is zooming around the Sun (about 107,000 km/h). And it and the Sun (and all the other planets) are hurtling around the centre of the Milky Way (around 828,000 km/h).

So if you jump up, why don’t you flying away?

Because you are also moving with the Earth.

Motion is generally relative; it doesn’t really matter how fast you are going, what matters is how fast you are going compared with whatever you care about.

In terms of you and the Earth, even if you are both moving really fast relative to the Sun, or the centre of the galaxy, compared with each other you’re hardly moving at all.

And the same works out for getting back to the Earth from the Moon. Sure, the Earth is moving really fast through space, but the Moon moves with the Earth (rotating around it).

When dealing with space travel mostly you just have to worry about your “local” movement compared with whatever the biggest thing nearby is. So when going between the Earth and the Moon you can mostly treat the Earth as fixed in space (if spinning). At least, once you’ve got far enough away from the Moon that it isn’t affecting you much. Getting from the Moon back to the Earth is in some ways easier than going the other way, as the Earth is bigger so easier to get pulled towards and hit.

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