The latest development of flight, space travel, is still a great unknown.
The imagination of men are never confined to their most contemporary idea, but
always seeking to push the limits of the physical universe. The evolution of
flight has brought us to the outermost of the earth's atmosphere, which we call simply, "space."
Because the air is very thin in the upper atmosphere, it is impossible for normal planes to fly to that altitude by the principles of flight. Therefore, in order to explore, the means of sheer force have to be used. Huge thrust-producing machines, better known as rockets, propelling a craft outside our atmosphere is the only way to explore space.
For a shuttle to take off the ground it has to push 4.5 million lbs. off
the ground, which requires phenominal rocket power! In addition to
firing it's own engines, it has two solid rocket boosters powered by a
large fuel tank. The fuel tank holds 500,000 gallons of liquid oxygen
and liquid hydrogen.
When the rockets are finished getting the shuttle away from most of the pull
of gravitiy, but not into space, they fall away from the shuttle and into
to the ocean where they can be retreived and used again. The fuel is then detached after exiting the atmosphere, and the tank falls back into the atmosphere where it burns up, never to be used again.
The shuttle, after completeing its mission, enters the atmosphere the bottom first. At this time the shuttle experiences extreme temperatures.
The space shuttle lands like a an airplane, slowing from thousands of miles per hour upon its entrance of the atomosphere!
New developments in flight are constantly being researched and analyzed. But the future of flight is only as concrete as speculation. Who knows? Man can only assume at what the future can hold, and use his limited intellect to progress a boundless imagination. Only a little over a hundred years ago, man thought flight was limited to our dreams. How many dreams of today will become the realities of the future?