Introduction to Aerospace Flight Vehicles

January 2026 Release

This eBook provides a comprehensive introduction to aerospace engineering, covering a range of topics in an interactive, engaging format. It employs evidence-based teaching practices, such as scaffolded learning, to help students

and other interested individuals understand and apply the material to multiple problems. The eBook includes detailed text and illustrations, worked examples, self-assessment quizzes, and opportunities for further discussion in and out of the classroom. Hyperlinks to additional resources are also provided for those who want to explore the topics further. It concludes with many worked examples and application problems to reinforce the covered technical concepts.

LICENSE

Introduction to Aerospace Flight Vehicles, ISBN 979-8-9852614-0-0  © 2022–2026 by J. Gordon Leishman is copyrighted content licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted. Other content may be included based on fair use. Fair use for educational purposes is permitted by copyright statute. The Copyright Disclaimer, under Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976, states that fair use is allowed for teaching, scholarship, and research.

This free, open-access educational resource is available to all students at universities, colleges, and schools, as well as to anyone interested in the content. Individuals can use any content, including text and figures in original form, in any other application or context within the terms of the Creative Commons license or fair use. Please cite the source as “Introduction to Aerospace Flight Vehicle” by J. Gordon Leishman under the terms of a Creative Commons, non-commercial, and non-derivative (CC NC, CC BY-NC) license and/or by citation to an individual chapter or figure.

For students enrolled in courses, note that this eBook is provided free of charge for personal study. However, uploading or sharing these materials on commercial-for-profit websites such as Chegg, Course Hero, or similar services is strictly forbidden. Doing so violates the Creative Commons license, may breach your university’s or college’s academic integrity policies, and may lead to disciplinary action under those policies in addition to legal consequences for the uploader for copyright infringement under U.S. and International copyright law. Any unauthorized posting of the content of this eBook, in whole or in part, on commercial websites will be subject to a DMCA takedown notification and further legal actions for copyright infringement.

For questions, comments, suggestions, dialogue, advice, teaching resources, etc., please get in touch with the author via email at FlightVehicles.eBook@gmail.com