Rocket

For other uses, see Rocket (disambiguation).

A Soyuz-FG rocket launches from "Gagarin's Start" (Site 1/5), Baikonur Cosmodrome

A rocket (from Italian: rocchetto, lit. ''bobbin/spool'', and so named for its shape)[nb 1][1] is a vehicle that uses jet propulsion to accelerate without using any surrounding air. A rocket engine produces thrust by reaction to exhaust expelled at high speed.[2] Rocket engines work entirely from propellant carried within the vehicle; therefore a rocket can fly in the vacuum of space. Rockets work more efficiently in a vacuum and incur a loss of thrust due to the opposing pressure of the atmosphere.

Multistage rockets are capable of attaining escape velocity from Earth and therefore can achieve unlimited maximum altitude. Compared with airbreathing engines, rockets are lightweight and powerful and capable of generating large accelerations. To control their flight, rockets rely on momentum, airfoils, auxiliary reaction engines, gimballed thrust, momentum wheels, deflection of the exhaust stream, propellant flow, spin, or gravity.

Rockets for military and recreational uses date back to at least 13th-century China.[3] Significant scientific, interplanetary and industrial use did not occur until the 20th century, when rocketry was the enabling technology for the Space Age, including setting foot on the Moon. Rockets are now used for fireworks, missiles and other weaponry, ejection seats, launch vehicles for artificial satellites, human spaceflight, and space exploration.

Chemical rockets are the most common type of high power rocket, typically creating a high speed exhaust by the combustion of fuel with an oxidizer. The stored propellant can be a simple pressurized gas or a single liquid fuel that disassociates in the presence of a catalyst (monopropellant), two liquids that spontaneously react on contact (hypergolic propellants), two liquids that must be ignited to react (like kerosene (RP1) and liquid oxygen, used in most liquid-propellant rockets), a solid combination of fuel with oxidizer (solid fuel), or solid fuel with liquid or gaseous oxidizer (hybrid propellant system). Chemical rockets store a large amount of energy in an easily released form, and can be very dangerous. However, careful design, testing, construction and use minimizes risks.[citation needed]


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  1. ^ Bernhard, Jim (2007). Porcupine, Picayune, & Post: How Newspapers Get Their Names. University of Missouri Press. p. 126. ISBN 978-0-8262-6601-9. Retrieved 28 May 2016.
  2. ^ Sutton, George P.; Biblarz, Oscar (2001). Rocket Propulsion Elements. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-0-471-32642-7. Archived from the original on 12 January 2014. Retrieved 28 May 2016.
  3. ^ MSFC History Office. "Rockets in Ancient Times (100 B.C. to 17th Century)". A Timeline of Rocket History. NASA. Archived from the original on 2009-07-09. Retrieved 2009-06-28.