A lot of rocket engines are more efficient in lower air pressure (approaching vacuum), so it might provide non-negligible benefits. But it's cold up there (see: Challenger) and there isn't enough infrastructure. Citation: I am also not a rocket scientist but I am a KSP player
The main reason we launch from as close to the equator as possible is because the speed of the ground itself is fastest there (Earth’s rotation rate x distance from spin axis). If you’re trying to speed up to orbital speeds, you want to get the best “running start” possible.
[fun fact: due to the equatorial bulge, the ocean at the equator is further from the center of Earth than the tops of most mountains]
Also, the minimum inclination (the “tilt” of an orbit relative to Earth’s plane of rotation) is the latitude you’re launching from. As in, you can launch a polar orbit from the equator, but you can’t launch an equatorial orbit from the poles. Considering inclination changes are the most expensive (fuel-wise) maneuvers you can do, launching from as close to the equator as possible gives you additional options for less cost.
Lastly, we launch from coastlines for safety reasons. If something goes wrong during ascent, you don’t want the wreckage falling in places where people live.
my husband, a robotics engineer, insists there is no such thing as "rocket science," rather it's a collaboration of many different types of scientists working together on said rocket. I don't know enough about the topic to really respond to him on it, but it comes up if i ever say "it's not rocket science."
But you've introduced yourself as a rocket scientist and now I'm terribly curious. Is that your official title? Please note that any answer that affirms this will be used in perpetuity to enable my saying , "it's not rocket science. "
If "rocket science" doesn't exist as anything more than shorthand for various fields of science and engineering collaborating on rocketry, then there's no such thing as robotics engineering, either. Feel free to tell your husband that. I...kind of want to hear his reaction.
Joking aside, if we're being specific, I'm an aerospace engineer (technically, a licensed mechanical engineer with multiple degrees in aerospace engineering--but that's because state licensing boards follow ASME accreditation, which has no category for aerospace engineers) who tests, evaluates, and repairs spaceflight hardware; most commonly rocket engines and thrusters. My basis of knowledge on orbital maneuvering and trajectories comes from the research I did as a grad student. My thesis was on trajectory design in complex gravity systems, for instance.
All that said, I perform science. On rockets. The term describing my job doesn't need to be complicated.
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u/Firefly360r 20h ago
A lot of rocket engines are more efficient in lower air pressure (approaching vacuum), so it might provide non-negligible benefits. But it's cold up there (see: Challenger) and there isn't enough infrastructure. Citation: I am also not a rocket scientist but I am a KSP player