Talk:Ballistic capture

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Ballistic Capture
''' is the process of making it possible for a spaceship to land on a planet. The process consist of making a rocket or some propelled source move past a planet and then wait for the planet to continue on it's standard geo-synchronous orbit. The jet propelled source (spacecraft) will slow down and wait for the planet to intersect the the spacecraft, thereby making the source enter the planet's atmosphere at a speed that is conducive to landing. (Universe Today)

This method of landing an erectile was originally called "The Hohmann Transfer" and relies on precision timing and is a costly venture. This methodology was researched and orchestrated by Professor Francesco Tupputo and Edward Belbruno who are constituents of the Polytechnic Institute in Milan Italy and Princeton University, respectively. An article on the subject is published by ArXir Astrophysics.



The space craft engine boosters are used to speed up, slow down and keep the vessel in it's desired geo-synchronous position. NASA will pre-determined the flight patterns, landing and taking off of spacecrafts per specific specs of whatever the mission dictates.

Ballistic Capture

Low energy transfer was proposed by NASA officials to stabilize the spacecraft per the methodology to control the spacecraft. However, techniques have been implemented from the NASA space station in Florida and in Pasadena's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. However, ballistic capture transfers to the desired altitude within the ballistic capture set. When the stability of the spacecraft is in precise control, it affords for the earth control stations to utilize lower capture precision. The spacecraft's flexibility of launch period from the earth, moderate flight, are some of the other advantages of this Ballistic Capture.

RELATED ARTICLES Cosmic radiation makes Mars dangerous for humans Ballistic Transfer Capture

--PenPallRalph (talk) 20:02, 14 April 2015 (UTC) PenPallRalph (talk) 20:02, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

Proposal to delete/redirect to Low-energy transfer page
This article should really be deleted and redirected to the Low-energy transfer page. As it stands, most of the content appears to be drawn from one article in Scientific American and another in Universe Today. The mechanism described in the first paragraph applies to any transfer to a body in a higher orbit (Earth to the Moon, Earth to Mars...): the point about the low-energy transfer is the specific path to that insertion, not simply "allowing the planet to catch up" (although this would be true for a low-energy transfer to Mars, it's an over-simplification). The assertion in the paragraph about the Hohmann transfer is wrong because a low-energy transfer is generally much slower because of the roundabout path. And finally the last paragraph about using the atmosphere is irrelevant to the subject: that is Aerobraking, which obviously cannot apply for the Moon, and this last paragraph is in open contradiction with the second paragraph about the Hiten mission. 82.123.234.4 (talk) 14:19, 21 January 2016 (UTC)


 * No, this is not low energy transfer. It's a new type of orbit, takes a similar time period to Hohmann transfer, and with the advantage that you can launch at any time. I would say this should not be merged with Low-energy transfer. But there were inaccuracies in the article which I've fixed which hopefully will make it clearer what it is and how it works. Robert Walker (talk) 17:13, 3 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the updates. But the cited scientific american source itself says "Ballistic capture, also called a low-energy transfer...". So a merger sounds appropriate offhand. ★NealMcB★ (talk) 16:56, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

Mostly about ballistic lunar transfer
'Ballistic lunar transfer (BLT)' in List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches pipes here, and most of the article (and refs) is about lunar transfer. Should we have a BLT section here (in case it needs splitting out later) ? Also, the table of missions could have an extra column to identify the target body ? - Rod57 (talk) Rod57 (talk) 13:51, 5 August 2022 (UTC)


 * The current combination of this article, Hohmann transfer orbit, and Low-energy transfer is incredibly confusing to a non-professional like me, as these articles seem to be dedicated to near-identical subjects without clearly spelling the distinctions. Add to it that in 1970s NASA used the term "ballistic capture" to describe the maneuver used to reach the Hohmann orbit (cf. and the Fig 17 in it), and some claims of "firsts" (from 1980s) in this article (and the LET one) become incorrect, as they clearly refer to much more specific subject than the generic "ballistic transfer" technique - but do not spell out this crucial distinction. This article probably deserves to be renamed into Ballistic lunar transfer. Викидим (talk) 02:48, 15 November 2022 (UTC)