Posted on 08/12/2019 5:59:08 AM PDT by C19fan
Russian scientists have indicated that they were working on miniaturised sources of nuclear energy when a rocket engine exploded last week, increasing scrutiny of the possibility that the accident occurred while testing an experimental cruise missile powered by a small reactor.
The explosion last Thursday at a military testing ground in Russia’s Arkhangelsk region killed at least five people and caused radiation readings in neighbouring cities to spike to 20 times their normal level for half an hour.
Russia’s defence ministry said the explosion had taken place during testing of a rocket engine, but the country’s nuclear agency, Rosatom, later confirmed that several of its employees had been killed during testing of an “isotope power source in a liquid propulsion system”.
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
A WHAT???? Time for a modified version of "Hunt for Red October" meme replacing sub with nuclear.
We already have such things. They’re playing catch-up.
You can fly it with your mind but you have to think in Russian.
Cover story for a nuclear bomb.
Doesn’t the nuke engine emitting radiation makes itself inherently detectable?
Really, a nuclear powered cruise missile? Please source your claim.
First rule of a nuclear rocket engine, prevent blowing up! If can’t prevent blowing up then don’t build.
There was a US nuke cruise-missile program decades ago, a kind of doomsday device.
You’d launch it, it’d fly around venting continually into the open atmosphere, flying days, weeks or even MONTHS near the final target area.
It was abandoned as too dangerous.
We also had a nuclear bomber program. Proof of concept involved an old B-29, later a B-47 and I think there was even one nuclear B-52.
Also abandoned as too dangerous and lethal to the crew, which did get heavy special shielding.
Will we rocket launch nukes to serve as power source for Mars stuff..?
I am sure of that.
It was mostly a concept, never put into production and was never fielded. But there were tests.
It is possible. The US tried developing one of those a while back (late 50’s?) but it was messy and the Air Force terminated the program. Project Pluto, IIRC.
What could possibly go wrong?
My source is me. Work on such a system is not unclassified and would not be on the regular Internet. Think about it. I know of other weapons systems that have not seen the light of day but I am still not at liberty to reveal them, unlike President Carter and the KH-11.
“...possibility that the accident occurred while testing an experimental cruise missile powered by a small reactor.”
The Russians (and probably Chinese) have accidents because of what they’re working on to make sure they NEVER get defeated in combat. They are so far ahead of us in this area that not only would we be unable to catch up for generations, we’re not even at the point where we can understand what they’re doing.
Same with China, for that matter, when it comes to advanced weapon developments.
Sucks, but that’s the price we pay when our side sits out elections because so-and-so is a RINO, and ‘I’m going to teach the Republicans a lesson’ by allowing Democrats to win.
And they screwed it up? How hard can this be? I mean, it's not rocket science!
B36 flew the reactor, but not while critical.
We were working on nuclear powered airplanes in the 1950’s.
Project Pluto.
This sucker could even fly at low altitude, spreading radioactivity in its wake, ON PURPOSE, for a very long time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZHONQAMV48
Only Clint can do that. My favorite part was the canards wobbling on the iceburg. Pure cheapness. They must have put those on with duct tape.
At Mach 10 who cares?
There was a AP story about it about 3 months ago.
It is based on technology the USA developed in the early 60’s for the nuclear bomber and upper stage for the Saturn 5 to Mars.
It used ceramic construction to handle the high temp without cooling.
It actually worked (but would have worked better in the Saturn 5)
The problem is it threw out Gamma and fission products along with the thrust which is why it would have worked better in space.
I WAS RIGHT!
I said this was probably a nuclear weapon that exploded without going nuclear. (if they are not armed properly, just the conventional explosives go off).
I based my suggestion based upon what happened when a SAC bomber accidentally dropped a nuke in South Carolina back in the 60’s. The conventional explosives spread nuclear fuel into the atmosphere, but there was not thermonuclear explosion.
Their cover story is preposterous. But would result in a exactly the kind of radiation that an exploded bomb would.
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