Spinning Earth

[Giff]

Quote:Weightlessness in space is caused by a near absence of gravity: you're so far from the Earth (and any other large mass) that the net gravitational field at your position is near zero.

Yeah, I've heared that when someone walk in space and are weightless do that person falling towards earth but missing it. Same with the spacecraft.

[Kyuuketsuki]

(6th February 2009 16:30)DD_8630 Wrote:  Weightlessness in space is caused by a near absence of gravity: you're so far from the Earth (and any other large mass) that the net gravitational field at your position is near zero.

That is patently untrue as evidenced by the fact that NASA astronauts are given experience of weightlessness in a diving plane ... things are weightless in orbit because it is "falling" around the Earth at the same rate as it would be dragged to Earth by Gravity. There are complicating factors such as the lessened gravitational attraction of the Earth, the gravity of the Sun and moon etc. but essentially that is why weightlessness occurs (and why we tend to refer to mass rather than weight because regardless of weight, mass does not change).

Kyu