Reply to post: Re: Two solar masses (in energy) escaped

LIGO physicists eyeball a new gravitational wave

Anonymous Coward
Anonymous Coward

Re: Two solar masses (in energy) escaped

@Black Betty

"Same principle as a space probe getting a gravity assist by swinging around one planet on the way to another"

When a probe gets a gravity assist from a larger body it 'steals' energy from the velocity component of the larger body's momentum, not from its mass component, which remains unchanged.

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