# The "Space Elevator" Problem

<details>

<summary>Table of Contents</summary>

* Foreword
* The Problem
* Introduction
* References

</details>

## Foreword

I recently watched a compelling video by Dr. Angela Collier that critiques the mainstream's fascination with space elevators—highlighting how popular discussions, articles, reports, etc., often overlook the fundamental scientific and engineering challenges that make the concept unfeasible or outright impossible. I won’t delve into the details myself, as Dr. Collier does an exceptional job of breaking it all down. If you haven't seen it yet, I highly recommend checking it out below:

{% embed url="<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5aHMB4Tje4>" %}
Dr. Collier's incredible video about the topic
{% endembed %}

This brings me to the main focus of this blog post. In her video, Dr. Collier discusses a particularly interesting problem from the *Princeton Problems in Physics* (linked in the references below). I thought it was a neat challenge, so I skipped over that part of the video to try solving it on my own—which is exactly what I’ll be attempting here. Fair warning: my physics and math skills are a bit rusty, but this is also why I'm attempting to do this here; to unatrophy my physics and math muscles.

## Skyhook

The problem, known as the "skyhook" problem, is described as follows:

<figure><img src="/files/pbHKz0UaJCAehhgfzBN2" alt="" width="526"><figcaption><p>"Problem 1.3. Skyhook" — Chapter I,  Mechanics, <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691024493/princeton-problems-in-physics-with-solutions?srsltid=AfmBOorE-Jp14szw8zfjELEutUvXn85bXJ1aWRWve7TOqi9WTXHq9ZFy">Princeton Problems in Physics with Solutions</a>. </p></figcaption></figure>

## The Setup

## References


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