The International Space Station (ISS) orbits the Earth at an altitude of around 410 km. The ISS does not fall towards the Earth, and the astronauts & objects are floating weightlessly. On Earth’s surface, objects fall with a gravitational acceleration of approximately 9.81 m/s2.
(a) Show that the following equation gives the percentage P of how much the grav. acceleration decreases between the surface of Earth (R: Earth’s radius, 6371 km) and an object at altitude z:
