If a bomb goes off in space would there be fire and sound, because of no air.?

Answer 1

Explosions in Space

http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/1998-08/899689009.Ph.r.html

Main excerpts:

On Earth, the interaction with the surrounding matter, be it air, water, or whatever, means that the initial energy is very quickly, in a few milliseconds, spread out over a fairly large amount of matter, no matter what the nature of the explosive. This material, typically air, forms a luminous fireball that expands at the speed of sound in the air that has been heated by the explosion, which is faster than the speed of sound in ordinary cool air. The result is a shock wave at the surface of the fireball. As the fireball expands it compresses and heats the surrounding air, while losing energy by radiation and also because of the work it is doing on the outside air, all of which causes it to cool. Eventually it cools to the point where it is no longer luminous, the shock wave moves out ahead and makes the BANG! that we hear and that may knock down buildings, and a cloud of swirling debris, smoke, and maybe brownish nitrogen oxides are left behind.

In space, the first few milliseconds proceed as they would in air (say), but then the transfer of energy to the surrounding air never takes place. As a result the initial small, intensely hot fireball simply keeps expanding at very high speed, and the expanding gases and any fragments fly off in straight lines. The fireball cools by radiation at first, but as its density drops it becomes so transparent that radiation is suppressed. For a chemical high explosive, the expansion speed would be a few thousand feet per second. So for a moderate size explosive -- say 1 meter across -- the products will expand to 100 meters in probably less than 0.1 sec, meaning the density will have decreased by a factor of a million, and the visible explosion will effectively be over. Visually the effect would be of a very brief, brilliant flash in a region only a little bigger than the actual extent of the explosive material. Of course there would be no billowing swirling smoke, and any fragments would almost certainly be moving too fast to be visible. The effect would probably be something like that of a big flashbulb.

Answer 2

Bombs a most explosives are manufactured with Oxygen "built in" already, they do not have to rely on Oxygen from any surrounding atmosphere.
In order to have an explosion (rapid combustion), one would need some type of fuel and an oxidizer. Although fuel types can very greatly, Oxygen is a very common oxidizer; however, it is not the only oxidizer. There are chemical compounds which contain Oxygen chemically bonded are part of the compound, such as Potassium Nitrate, Potassium Chlorate, Ammonium Nitrate, and one of the most power oxidizers I can think of (too powerful to use in many cases), Potassium Permanganate. All these substances will gladly donate their Oxygen to support an explosion.
A bomb could, in theory, be detonated in space and cause an explosion. This does assume sufficient activation energy for the bomb's reaction to proceed, much of which is normally supplied by the ambient heat energy on Earth which is not present in space.

Sound waves travel by the vibration of particles in a medium. Without particles to vibrate, sound will not be heard. Space is pretty close to a total vacuum; therefore, no sound would normally be heard.
However, we earlier made the assumption that a bomb just exploded, and with it, quite a bit of particles were just thrown into space. The sound could propagate within these particles given their sufficient proximity to one another. The sound could not propagate without these particles, so the sound would be entirely contained within the debris of the explosion, so if you are not been engulfed in debris, you cannot hear anything.

In theory, yes, it would be possible to detonate a bomb in space which would produce a big ball of fire and debris (RAPIDLY expanding) as well as sound.

Answer 3

Yes, a bomb can go off in space.

Explosives burn so fast they could not possibly draw the oxygen they need from the air quickly enough. So to be an explosive a material has to have a component that is its own supply of oxygen, or an oxidising agent. In making gunpowder, the oxidising agent is saltpetre, which was originally made by collecting dried urine.

No, there would be no sound, because space is a vacuum. Sound needs a medium.

Answer 4

All that would happen when a bomb goes off in space is that shock waves would be felt by the objects close to the site of the explosion. In fact even in the normal circumstances (i.e on the Earth ) it is shock waves which causes us to hear the sound and this pressure results in the production of fire.

Answer 5

Since space is practically vaccuum, there would not be any sound. There could be some fire, though, because the bomb could have some oxygen inside of it. In conclusion, there would be no sound that you can hear for 100% (There would be vibrations, but there wouldn't be any substance for the vibrations to be transmitted). There could be some fire if the bomb had oxygen in it. If the bomb was oxygen-free, though, there wouldn't be a fire.

Answer 6

A bomb wouldnt go off in space, because you need Oxygen to fuel a fire

Answer 7

No there would be no sound and fire, provided that bomb is sealed with air inside in order for it to ignite and burn air. The would be an explosion but the fire would instantly disappear.

Answer 8

The fire would feed on the material of the bomb before the energy will blast out causing a bio loop. Depending on where it is in space depends on what density of space is of at least photon matter if not dark or element.
The explosion would begin and feed on it's explosive energy and matter then it would feed on the rubble. Like a blast of colour then just a powerful flash of colour and dispersement. Like the sun the matter would flash in energy not a large explosion, depending on the dark matter and photonic matter.

Answer 9

sound don't travel in space, if it did it would be too noisy because there are alot of explosions in the universe. however there would be fire because bombs provide the material that is needed to cause fire e.g. in a nuclear bomb, there is hydrogen which is highly flammable, so it doesn't need oxygen the fire is caused by the hydrogen.

Answer 10

There would be fire, sound, and a nice musical number by John Williams playing the background, just like in Star Wars, the movie we base all our scientific research upon. Long live the almighty George Lucas.