booster rockets
Spacecraft launch assistants
Booster rockets are auxiliary rockets that provide extra thrust during the initial phase of a launch, when a spacecraft must overcome Earth's gravity.
They typically detach and fall away once their fuel is exhausted, leaving the main rocket to continue.
The space shuttle's solid rocket boosters were recovered and reused.
The term extends to any supplementary propulsion system.
- ignitersSpark-producing devices
- stagingPreparing for presentation
- jettisonDeliberately discard, especially cargo
- rocketryScience of propelled spacecraft
- nozzleFlow-directing pipe fitting
thrusters · Saturn V · strap-on · combustion chambers · turbopumps · launch vehicles · oxidizers · reusable rockets · escape velocity · aerodynamics · fuel · countdown · go for launch · lift off · blast off · engines · ascent · spacecraft
- spaceflightlaunch, astronaut, spacecraft, liftoff, orbit
- rocketryrockets, thrust, third stage, nozzle, launch
- Space Programssatellite launch, launch vehicles, space station, lunar mission, space research
- solid rocket fuel
- space debrisspace junk, debris field, debris cloud, paint flakes, metal shards
booster rocketsmain engine
Central propulsion system
payload · fairing · structural components · avionics · fuel tanks