A bit of a tangent here…
In Arthur C. Clarke’s short story collection “The Wind from the Sun” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wind_from_the_Sun is a story called “Maelstrom II”. A manned launch from the moon to return to earth has a glitch, and it does not reach escape velocity; the story is about how the guy finds a way to avoid crashing back to the surface.