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Asked by Megan to Ioanna on 19 May 2025.
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Ioanna Bezirtzoglou answered on 19 May 2025:
Hi Megan, on earth, gravity is found at the core of our planet. Hence the further away you go from the core, the less gravity you have. For example, if you stand close to a fire, you will feel very hot – but the further you step away the less strong the heat is going to be! This is similar with how gravity works. Even if in our case it is thousands and thousands of kilometers instead of a few steps to even detect a change in gravity! Hence – astronauts ‘float’ when they are in space as they are sop far from the core of the earth that they do not get affected by gravity anymore 🙂
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Comments
Kirsty L commented on :
Astronauts float because they are constantly falling towards the Earth in a spacecraft that is falling at the same speed as them. due to gravity pulling the: it’s just that they are high and fast enough that floor keeps moving out of the way in a curve, so they keep falling. We call this an orbit.
Everything with mass- even you- produces a gravitational force, it is just that bigger things, or denser things (so something with a lot of stuff in it) produces more gravity. So compare to the Earth your pull of gravity is very small!
If you where on the ISS you would be pulled by about 90% of the earths gravitational force, but remember you and your spacecraft keep falling towards the Earth, but the Earth keeps moving away from you at the smae rate due to the curve. We can even simulate the falling together effect on Earth in 100% gravity ( 9,81m/s/s) using drop towers and special aeroplanes with 3 pilots or even sky driving.
The effect of Earths gravity goes across space to the Moon, the Sun and the other planets, it’s just that the Sun is so big compared to Earth that Earth doesn’t pull back on the Sun very much and the Earth orbits, or falls around the Sun.