KIDS TRIVIA

Detailed explanation-1: -Rocket engines work entirely from propellant carried within the vehicle; therefore a rocket can fly in the vacuum of space. Rockets work more efficiently in a vacuum and incur a loss of thrust due to the opposing pressure of the atmosphere.

Detailed explanation-2: -The efficiency of rockets is about 0.678 (source in german). Sounds bad at first, but thermodynamics has something called “carnot efficiency” which is the theoretically maximum technical efficiency for machines making work by heat. Mostly it results in something between 0.6 and 0.7 … making our rocket quite efficent.

Detailed explanation-3: -Rockets are more efficient in Earth’s atmosphere than in outer space because the air in Earth’s atmosphere helps to provide thrust to the rocket, and Earth has less air friction than the outer space.