Patrix, I am inclined to agree with you about NASA spacecraft not being able to escape the earths atmosphere and apart from the satellite image I would say the NASA diagram below is fairly accurate. The diagram also gives me more of an understanding of the Project Highwater data mentioned earlier in relation to water expulsion in space and its relevance to the debate on propulsion of rockets in space.
Diagram of the layers within Earth's atmosphere.
Troposphere
The troposphere starts at the Earth's surface and extends 8 to 14.5 kilometers high (5 to 9 miles). This part of the atmosphere is the most dense. Almost all weather is in this region.
Stratosphere
The stratosphere starts just above the troposphere and extends to 50 kilometers (31 miles) high. The ozone layer, which absorbs and scatters the solar ultraviolet radiation, is in this layer.
Mesosphere
The mesosphere starts just above the stratosphere and extends to 85 kilometers (53 miles) high. Meteors burn up in this layer
Thermosphere
The thermosphere starts just above the mesosphere and extends to 600 kilometers (372 miles) high. Aurora and satellites occur in this layer.
Ionosphere
The ionosphere is an abundant layer of electrons and ionized atoms and molecules that stretches from about 48 kilometers (30 miles) above the surface to the edge of space at about 965 km (600 mi), overlapping into the mesosphere and thermosphere. This dynamic region grows and shrinks based on solar conditions and divides further into the sub-regions: D, E and F; based on what wavelength of solar radiation is absorbed. The ionosphere is a critical link in the chain of Sun-Earth interactions. This region is what makes radio communications possible.
Exosphere
This is the upper limit of our atmosphere. It extends from the top of the thermosphere up to 10,000 km (6,200 mi).
Credit: NASA/Goddard
What is relevant to our water released in space scenario is the ionosphere and solar radiation absorbtion.
More specifically if we go back to the data report I linked to on the previous page it states...
"the ProJect High Water has provided essential Information relevant to a number of problems vital to --------- * explorations of space.
*(I could not make out the missing word)
Detailed knowledge of the dispersal of large quantities of liquids in space permits the determination of first order engineering parameters associated with an abort or explosion in space.
The first water release occurred in April 1962 at an altitude of 105 km (SA-2) and the second release was in November 1962 at an altitude of 165 km (8A-3)
The US Standard Atmosphere (1961) gives the atmospheric pressure at km at 105km l.3 x 10-4 torr (mm of Hg), and 2.4 x 10-6 torr at 165km
The water released, through ruptures to the container, expanded 'initially average expansion rate velocity of 1,05 km/seci. however, expansion rate velocities as high as 3.60 km/sec were observed.'
Laboratory experiments simulating the release of water into the ionosphere have been carried out in a Space Environment Simulator (SES).
These tests were performed with ambient pressures within the SES at 1.1 x 10-4 torr The pre-release chamber pressure was 1.4 x 10-4 torr.
Following the release, the chamber pressure rose to 3.2 x 10-2 torr."
An Analysis of the Second Project High Water Data
https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi ... 078055.pdf
Would the same result occur if water was released at the upper limit of our atmosphere (exosphere) and the boundaries of space where I would suspect solar radiation is at a greater level and the pressure would be less?
I realise people state there's zero pressure in a vacuum because there's no matter to be pressurised and as such no reaction would take place but wouldn't that change once matter was introduced?
For example from the Project Highwater....
Consider a spherical mass of fluid initially at rest in a region of zero pressure at time t=O the restraining membrane is instantaneously
removed allowing the fluid to expand into the evacuated region.
In the lab experiment reaction of water exposed to minimal pressure took place rapidly.
An examination of the film records showed that the water emerged as a multiplicity of minute droplets. These droplets rapidly dispersed.
A portion of the droplets were converted to ice particles. Freezing of the droplets probably commenced almost immediately. A significant
fraction of the droplets froze within five(5) milliseconds, and after 10 milliseconds, all of the remaining droplets were frozen.
That there is now matter in the environment of space, ice droplets, would pressure be created on contact with them by solar radiation / solar wind?
The below from Wiki, and I realise that much of the data is gleaned from supposed satellites and spacecraft, however this is what's stated.....
Solar wind
The solar wind is a stream of charged particles released from the upper atmosphere of the Sun, called the corona. This plasma consists of mostly electrons, protons and alpha particles with thermal energies between 1.5 and 10 keV. Embedded within the solar-wind plasma is the interplanetary magnetic field. The solar wind varies in density, temperature and speed over time and over solar latitude and longitude.
While early models of the solar wind relied primarily on thermal energy to accelerate the material, by the 1960s it was clear that thermal acceleration alone cannot account for the high speed of solar wind. An additional unknown acceleration mechanism is required and likely relates to magnetic fields in the solar atmosphere.
The solar wind is observed to exist in two fundamental states, termed the slow solar wind and the fast solar wind, though their differences extend well beyond their speeds. In near-Earth space, the slow solar wind is observed to have a velocity of 300–500 km/s, a temperature of 1.4–1.6×106 K and a composition that is a close match to the corona. By contrast, the fast solar wind has a typical velocity of 750 km/s, a temperature of 8×105 K and it nearly matches the composition of the Sun's photosphere. The slow solar wind is twice as dense and more variable in nature than the fast solar wind.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_wind
Radiation pressure
Radiation pressure is the pressure exerted upon any surface exposed to electromagnetic radiation. Radiation pressure implies an interaction between electromagnetic radiation and bodies of various types, including clouds of particles or gases. The interactions can be absorption, reflection, or some of both (the common case). Bodies also emit radiation and thereby experience a resulting pressure.
Johannes Kepler put forward the concept of radiation pressure back in 1619 to explain the observation that a tail of a comet always points away from the Sun.
The assertion that light, as electromagnetic radiation, has the property of momentum and thus it exerts a pressure upon any surface it is exposed to was published by James Clerk Maxwell in 1862, and proven experimentally by Russian physicist Pyotr Lebedev in 1900 and by Ernest Fox Nichols and Gordon Ferrie Hull in 1901.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_pressure
Comet
A comet is an icy small Solar System body that, when passing close to the Sun, warms and begins to release gases, a process called outgassing. This produces a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena are due to the effects of solar radiation and the solar wind acting upon the nucleus of the comet.
The streams of dust and gas thus released form a huge and extremely thin atmosphere around the comet called the "coma". The force exerted on the coma by the Sun's radiation pressure and solar wind cause an enormous "tail" to form pointing away from the Sun.
The coma is generally made of H2O and dust, with water making up to 90% of the volatiles that outflow from the nucleus when the comet is within 3 to 4 astronomical units (450,000,000 to 600,000,000 km; 280,000,000 to 370,000,000 mi) of the Sun. The H2O parent molecule is destroyed primarily through photodissociation and to a much smaller extent photoionization, with the solar wind playing a minor role in the destruction of water compared to photochemistry. Larger dust particles are left along the comet's orbital path whereas smaller particles are pushed away from the Sun into the comet's tail by light pressure.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comet
Would the above pressure created by solar wind /solar radiation have the same effect on a water releasing rocket and generate enough force to maintain continued momentum in space?