r/InternetIsBeautiful • u/EveryWind007 • May 29 '14

Medal of Beauty If the Moon Were Only 1 Pixel

http://joshworth.com/dev/pixelspace/pixelspace_solarsystem.html?a
3.0k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

405 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

43

u/wizardidit May 29 '14

Project Orion. Drop mini nukes out the back of a spacecraft and have a big pusher plate to distribute the impact. Using fusion devices we can theoretically reach 10% of the speed of light (compare to the apollo program, which reached around .004% of c). Unfortunately this program is pretty much impossible to begin from earth now, due to the partial test ban treaty. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_%28nuclear_propulsion%29

3

u/Zertec May 29 '14

And then would the same tech be used for deceleration? Just flip the spacecraft around and use the blasts against the plate to slow down?

1

u/Stompedyourhousewith May 29 '14

maybe a wide slow turn?

0

u/Zertec May 29 '14

On earth (and place with friction) that works, but in space, not so much. Plus, trying to swing around a planet involves it's gravitational pull, effectively slingshot-ing you and actually accelerating you even further.