• KISSmyOSFeddit@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    The re-entry burn is the burn to slow down your spacecraft below orbital speeds, initiating re-entry.
    Every spacecraft that wants to land back on earth after orbiting it needs to do a re-entry burn.
    The only exception, theoretically, are spacecraft that return from outside earth’s orbit. They could in theory re-enter by steering towards the atmosphere at the right angle. I don’t know if they actually do that in practice or slow down to orbital speeds first, though.

    • rImITywR@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      What you’re talking about is usually referred to as a de-orbit burn. Sure somebody could call it a reentry burn, but not SpaceX. What SpaceX calls a reentry burn is the maneuver when a Falcon 9 booster lights its engines as it first hits the atmosphere to slow down and move the heating away from it’s body. Neither the super heavy booster nor the ship make a maneuver like this.

      IFT3 did not make a de-orbit burn, and there is not one planned for IFT4 either.