Would you support the construction of a nuclear Starship called Project Orion?

Question

http://www.projectorion.org

What do you think?

Answer 1

Yes, excellent idea.

Answer 2

I don't suppose a lot of the others have noticed, that a lot of the space probes that have gone up in the past, had nuclear reactors as their primary sources of power, with solar panels as suplementary/auxillary power.

Babe, using nuclear power for spacecraft has been on the books for decades, and it has been used for spacecraft.

As for using nuclear power for an extra solar spaceship, it has yet to be done. Because of the limitations of technology. The best that we can do is a fragment of the speed of light.
There is no faster-than-the-speed-of-light space-drive. No matter how you put a spin of the concept.
A true "starship" only exists in the pages and media of science-fiction and fantasy.

Answer 3

This is a superb idea. Unfortunately, using nuclear power to move the spaceship would run into a host of problems, including mass uproar about nuclear bombs, forcing politicians to turn their backs on the project (and scientists need the politicians to sell the idea). This, I suppose, could be solved by using regular rocket boosters to enter space, then switch to the nuclear power for the rest of the journey. There is still the problem of the building of nuclear weapons. Article 1 of the Treaty Banning the Testing of Nuclear Weapons says that nobody is allowed to test them in the atmosphere (among other places).

Answer 4

Unfortunately, the bad effects of nuclear explosions extends to the Van Allen radiation belts (charged particles would be trapped and destroy satellites), and a orion ship is much to large to assemble in high orbit from things launched from earh. My guess is that orion ships will one day be built, but only from materials mined from the moon or other celestial bodies beyond earth's orbit. It could then never be driven near earth.

Answer 5

Nuclear propulsion is the only way to do deep space and a more senceable way of doing lunaer and mars projects. It makes much more sence than conventional methods where storage of fuel versus storage of life supplies and scientific equipment needs to be taken into account. The security concerns are a nightmare though.

Answer 6

You'd need some crazy security to make sure some crazy astronaut doesn't steal 'em and lob them back to Earth. There's no space police to stop anyone. I mean honestly, safety issues exist just getting the darn thing into orbit. Rockets don't have a clean track record of making it into space all the time. Sometimes they blown up! Imagine if one carrying a few nukes exploded and sent nuclear fallout into the upper atmosphere to be blown around for all of us to breath.

Answer 7

Why? What good does it do John Doe? Feed him? Clothe or shelter him? Do any good on this planet we can touch or measure except for keeping a bunch of scientists off the homeless rolls? A politically untouchable way to do something that doesn't need to be done at all.

Answer 8

Even such a ship could not go far. Maybe it could be used to travel between Earth and Mars, nothing more. We need some revolutionary discovery to begin really exploring the Space.

Answer 9

yeah, why not, but how would they dispose of it after it gets to old... hmm,

actually its not really a happy thought having one of those blow up in orbit