Orion is one of the great "what if's" of the twentieth century. Today, nuclear powered spaceships seem like little more than laughably naive 1950's science fiction, but it might have been otherwise...and still could be.
Orion was a project aimed at discovering the feasibility of spaceships driven by nuclear bombs. The initial plan called for manned missions to Mars by 1965 and Saturn by 1970. After seven years of work, the project's technical challenges seemed surmountable, but political obstacles brought the effort to a halt.
Kind of makes one wonder what might have been possible if only we'd been just that little bit more daring doesn't it. I myself would be quite amenable to new research into the possibility of a ground launch. While it may be impossible to build 100% clean pulse units(bombs) I'm certain we could devise ways of diminishing fallout levels to acceptable levels. Alternative material for bomb casings. Larger bombs to get more bang for less fissionables. Ofcourse that all depends on our definition of "acceptable levels". Personally I'd limit it to one launch and from Antarctica to eliminate any danger to life in the immediate vicinity. Antarctica being completely lifeless.
As fallout is in fact irradiated matter such as 'ground dirt' which is sucked up during the detonation in the thousands of tons we could probably elimate that too. Just by building a thick steel launchpad. Coated with grease to reduce ablation. Much as the original planners intended to coat the pusher plate with grease between pulses.
Once its off the ground there are only atmospheric bursts and they are pretty clean.
Assuming a 100,000 ton vehicle to make use of thermonuclear pulse units( a thousand times cleaner than fission bombs), we could safely lift a further 90,000 tons as cargo and set up all the industrial infrastructure in space necessary to get a permanent foothold out there. You know, mining equipment to turn asteroids into more Orion vehicles, several hundred workers, a couple of large moon bases if we want to get sentimental and plenty of spare pulse units for later forays into the outer system using new vehicles. Assuming we can't locate the raw materials necessary to build pulse units while we are out there.
A ship of that size would be analogous to a Super Tanker or the QE2. Television rights alone would go a long way towards financing the mission.
http://www.projectorion.com
Orion was a project aimed at discovering the feasibility of spaceships driven by nuclear bombs. The initial plan called for manned missions to Mars by 1965 and Saturn by 1970. After seven years of work, the project's technical challenges seemed surmountable, but political obstacles brought the effort to a halt.
Kind of makes one wonder what might have been possible if only we'd been just that little bit more daring doesn't it. I myself would be quite amenable to new research into the possibility of a ground launch. While it may be impossible to build 100% clean pulse units(bombs) I'm certain we could devise ways of diminishing fallout levels to acceptable levels. Alternative material for bomb casings. Larger bombs to get more bang for less fissionables. Ofcourse that all depends on our definition of "acceptable levels". Personally I'd limit it to one launch and from Antarctica to eliminate any danger to life in the immediate vicinity. Antarctica being completely lifeless.
As fallout is in fact irradiated matter such as 'ground dirt' which is sucked up during the detonation in the thousands of tons we could probably elimate that too. Just by building a thick steel launchpad. Coated with grease to reduce ablation. Much as the original planners intended to coat the pusher plate with grease between pulses.
Once its off the ground there are only atmospheric bursts and they are pretty clean.
Assuming a 100,000 ton vehicle to make use of thermonuclear pulse units( a thousand times cleaner than fission bombs), we could safely lift a further 90,000 tons as cargo and set up all the industrial infrastructure in space necessary to get a permanent foothold out there. You know, mining equipment to turn asteroids into more Orion vehicles, several hundred workers, a couple of large moon bases if we want to get sentimental and plenty of spare pulse units for later forays into the outer system using new vehicles. Assuming we can't locate the raw materials necessary to build pulse units while we are out there.
A ship of that size would be analogous to a Super Tanker or the QE2. Television rights alone would go a long way towards financing the mission.
http://www.projectorion.com
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