History Main / SpaceshipSlingshotStunt

* Slingshot maneuvers around Jupiter and its moons were used to give the twin ''Voyager'' spacecraft the extra impetus and direction to go onwards to encounter Uranus and Neptune. Otherwise, they would have run out of fuel and propulsive power and taken a lot longer to reach the outermost planets.

* The ''Galileo'' spacecraft, which was crashed into the Jovian atmosphere in 2003, used slingshots from Venus, Earth, and Earth again to gain enough velocity to reach Jupiter. The ''Cassini'' spacecraft (which was controlled to crash into Saturn in Sep 15th, 2017), has made two flybys of Venus, one of the Earth, and one of Jupiter to boost her towards Saturn, as well as using Titan's (Saturn's largest moon) gravity to change her orbit, allowing exploration of the Saturnian system. The ''Rosetta'' mission which used four gravity assists (Earth, Mars, Earth and Earth ''again'') to catch the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Finally, ''JUICE'', launching in 2022, will probably take the record for the highest usage of gravity assists in a single mission, using ''five'' gravity assists--Earth, Venus, Earth, Mars, and Earth ''again''--to boost it up to an orbit around Jupiter in 2032, and then 30 more gravity assists off Jupiter's moons Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto to slow it down enough to enter orbit around Ganymede in 2034.
* The ''Parker Solar Probe'' inverts the typical version of this, using a grand total of 7 Venus flybys (the first of which was in early October 2018) to shed orbital velocity until its orbit is much closer around the Sun instead of reaching Earth or near-Earth orbit every perihelion.
* The ''MESSENGER'' probe needed a complex series of gravity assists before it could insert itself into orbit around Mercury due to Mercury being both the smallest planet (requiring a relatively low speed in order to stay in orbit) and the closest to the Sun (requiring a lot of Earth's orbital velocity be shed to get there). This maneuver involved one flyby of Earth, two of Venus, and three of Mercury itself over the course of seven years, after which it was sent into a highly elongated orbit of Mercury to protect the probe from heat radiated by Mercury's surface.

* The ''VideoGame/StarControl'' games features [[TwoDSpace top-down 2D maps]] where two ships at a time duke it out, usually complete with a planet in the middle to act as a hazard and a gravity well. Using the planet's gravity to slingshot yourself across the map (or to trap an enemy ship) is a cornerstone of the game's combat style.

The [[CommandRoster Crew]] of the CoolStarship is on the verge of a planet's gravity well or near an UnrealisticBlackHole. Perhaps they are too close for the engines to escape gravity's grasp. Perhaps an enemy ship is closing them. All seems lost...

Then the AcePilot makes a suggestion: Head straight for the planet / black hole! The rest of the crew look at him as if he was mad, but follow his plan, and like magic, they pick up speed and wind up shooting out of the gravity well at incredible speed using [[GravitySucks gravity]] to perform a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slingshot_effect slingshot maneuver]] (also called Gravity Assist or Gravitational Slingshot) and escape!

** Warp-powered gravitational slingshots are used a method of time travel in the franchise, especially in ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' and ''Film/{{Star Trek IV|The Voyage Home}}''.
** Conventional slingshots without time travels feature in ''WesternAnimation/StarTrekTheAnimatedSeries'' episode "Beyond the Farthest Star" and ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "Booby Trap".
** In "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS6E10ChainOfCommand Chain Of Command]]", Geordie and Jellico mention doing the "Titan's Turn". A risky move done by shuttle pilots doing the Jovian Run between Jupiter and Saturn where they would accelerate towards Titan and then graze the atmosphere before turning sharply around the limb of the moon. It's implied to be illegal as the pilot's next action would be to pray that nobody saw them.
** One episode of ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' had Janeway attempting to drive off an alien force that had been experimenting on her crew by flying between a pair of pulsars. Tuvok remarks that it's a far more reckless course of action than he'd come to expect from her. The aliens leave rather than face the pulsars, but ''Voyager'' flies through, counting on their momentum to help them escape. Once they're safe on the other side, Janeway remarks she didn't know Tuvok thought she was reckless, to which he responds, "Poor choice of words, Captain. It was clearly an understatement".

** In ''[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS6E10ChainOfCommand Chain Of Command]]'', Geordie and Jellico mention doing the "Titan's Turn". A risky move done by shuttle pilots doing the Jovian Run between Jupiter and Saturn where they would accelerate towards Titan and then graze the atmosphere before turning sharply around the limb of the moon. It's implied to be illegal as the pilot's next action would be to pray that nobody saw them.

* In ''Film/Armageddon1998'', while explaining the plan of getting to the asteroid, Dan Truman, NASA director, mentions that they will use a slingshot move around the moon to gain speed. As soon as he hears the word "slingshot," Rockhound, resident wise-ass, mentions that he saw this happen before when The Coyote used an Acme slingshot and that it didn't work out too well for him. Truman dryly responds, "We have better slingshots than the Coyote."

** Han Solo has the ''Millennium Falcon'' does this to escape the GeniusLoci in ''Franchise/StarWars: Literature/GalaxyOfFear''. He lampshades this by calling it the "oldest trick in the manual."
** A semi-regular appearance during the [[Literature/NewJediOrder Yuuzhan Vong War]] where the maneuver is called a [[http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Solo_Slingshot "Solo Slingshot."]] In this instance the ship is being slingshot around a miniature ''singularity'' instead of a planet and is thus much faster and more dangerous that usual with Han being the first pilot skilled/crazy enough to pull it off. Late in the war the Yuuzhan Vong themselves make use of this tactic much to the chagrin of Han's daughter Jaina.

** One episode of ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' had Janeway attempting to drive off an alien force that had been experimenting on her crew by flying between a pair of pulsars. Tuvok remarks that it's a far more reckless course of action than he'd come to expect from her. The aliens leave rather than face the pulsars, but ''Voyager'' flies through, counting on their momentum to help them escape. Once they're safe on the other side, Janeway remarks she didn't know Tuvok thought she was reckless, to which he responds, "Poor choice of words, Captain. It was clearly an understatement."