matthen

When launching a rocket into orbit, would you rather launch it East, West, or doesn’t it matter? Well to get into orbit, you need two things; to be high above the ground, and to be travelling at a high speed tangentially to the Earth.  Unless you are on one of the poles, you are already travelling at a high speed tangentially to the Earth due to its spin.  This spin acts to give you a boost if you launch East.  The above animation shows a launch site on the equator launching both East (blue) and West (red), and what happens as the Earth spins up. Most launch sites therefore launch eastwards over the sea. However Russia launches over populated areas of Kazakhstan, and Israel launches Westward over the Mediterranean, at a cost of increased fuel usage, to avoid launching over its neighbours. [more] [code]