Re-entry to earth's atmosphere

Britalian · #1 Jun 24, 2008, 09:14 PM

Forgive the naivete of this question. We all know that spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere utilize heat shields to protect the astronuats due to the high speed of the spacecraft. Obviously if there was another way to re-enter the atmosphere if would have been used by now. For instance, if, theoretically, it were possible to re-enter at a very slow speed.
So is a slow-speed method possible? Would the heat shield become un-necessary?
Thank you!

WVHiflyer · Jun 24, 2008, 10:03 PM

I suppose 'retro' rockets might enable a slower reentry, but then the craft would have to take so much fuel up with it that getting it into orbit in the 1st place would be a real challenge.



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