Flying into space is not mainly about climbing higher: a spacecraft reaches orbit by accelerating sideways to roughly 28,000 kilometres per hour, fast enough to keep falling around Earth

Flying into space is not mainly about climbing higher: a spacecraft reaches orbit by accelerating sideways to roughly 28,000 kilometres per hour, fast enough to keep falling around Earth

A rocket leaves the pad vertically because the ground is beneath it and the thickest part of the atmosphere is directly ahead. Watch a little longer, though, and the path begins to lean. The vehicle that appeared to be climbing towards space starts turning towards the horizon. That turn is not a correction or a shortcut. It is the heart of the flight. Flying into space and entering orbit are different achievements. Height gets a spacecraft out o…