... Spacecraft . ... To space by cannon? Finally, the deep space explorers --spacecraft which break away from the Earth's gravity . ... The "Luna" series of the USSR conducted 7 soft landing of unmanned probes, two of them with wheeled robotic "Lunokhods," and two of those missions returned samples to Earth. Others spacecraft have visited the major planets of the Solar system. ... The Mariner series have explored Venus and Mars--and Mariner 10 even reached Mercury, for three separate encounters! ...
... With enough velocity, a spacecraft can break loose from the Earth's gravity and enter an orbit around the Sun, like that of a planet. If it then orbits the Sun with the same period as the Earth--one year--it may keep a fixed position relative to Earth. ... If the distance is just right--about 4 times the distance to the Moon or 1/100 the distance to the Sun--the spacecraft, too, will need just one year to go around the Sun, and will keep its position between the Sun and the Earth. ...
... How much brighter is the Sun as viewed from the planet Mercury as compared to Earth ? ... Actually, all of these questions can be answered through a very simple mathematical relationship known as the inverse square law. ... As the distance from the Sun increases the surface area of the sphere grows by the square of the distance. ... Common sense tells us that the Sun will be brighter and the inverse square law tells us how much brighter. ... gr = 0.912 G or 91.2% gravity felt at Earth's surface. ...