Comment on xkcd #2929: Good and Bad Ideas
frezik@midwest.social 1 week agoJust as an observation, there was a time when everyone on the Internet was gaga over the idea of Project Orion, and you didn’t dare speak out against it lest you get a hail of downvotes.
It’d work fine in deep space. It’s not a good idea to launch of Earth this way. But again, we’ll probably find something better once we’re at the stage of needing it.
szczuroarturo@programming.dev 1 week ago
But then how would you launch nukes on orbit without the risk of accudental nuclear explosion?
frezik@midwest.social 1 week ago
Implosion-type nukes are all but impossible to make go off that way. They need a whole bunch of small explosives to go off very precisely to squeeze the core in just the right way. A short circuit or a crash won’t have the necessary precision. This isn’t entirely safe, either–it can still cause a small explosion with a flash of fallout and radiation–but it’s a manageable problem.
Gun-types (Little Boy was one) are easier to go off on accident, but the US retired its last gun-type design decades ago. I don’t think Russia used them much, either. They’re only good for smaller bombs, and their safety issues make them questionable for any use. Smaller nuclear powers aren’t bothering with them.