Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
NASA artist rendering, from 1999, of the Project Orion pulsed nuclear fission spacecraft. Project Orion was a study conducted in the 1950s and 1960s by the United States Air Force, DARPA, [1] and NASA into the viability of a nuclear pulse spaceship that would be directly propelled by a series of atomic explosions behind the craft.
Project Orion was the first serious attempt to design a nuclear pulse rocket. A design was formed at General Atomics during the late 1950s and early 1960s, with the idea of reacting small directional nuclear explosives utilizing a variant of the Teller–Ulam two-stage bomb design against a large steel pusher plate attached to the spacecraft ...
Nuclear power sources could also be used to provide the spacecraft with electrical power for operations and scientific instrumentation. [12] Examples: NERVA (Nuclear Energy for Rocket Vehicle Applications), a US nuclear thermal rocket program; Project Rover, an American project to develop a nuclear thermal rocket. The program ran at the Los ...
STORY: NASA's Orion capsule is setting new records[Date: November 28, 2022][Bill Nelson, NASA Administrator]"On Saturday, Orion surpassed the distance record for a mission with a spacecraft ...
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The United States plans to test a spacecraft engine powered by nuclear fission by 2027 as part of a long-term NASA effort to demonstrate more efficient methods of propelling ...
Orion spacecraft as of December 2019. The Orion spacecraft was designed for the Constellation program as a crew compartment for use in low Earth orbit. Lockheed Martin was selected as the prime contractor for the Orion project on August 31, 2006, [18] and Boeing was selected to build its primary heat shield on September 15, 2006. [19]
The Air Force is set to launch an unarmed missile from Vandenberg Space Force Base overnight, in a demonstration of the readiness of the U.S. nuclear arsenal. Clear skies will make the spectacle ...
The Enzmann starship proposed in 1964 is a large fusion-powered spacecraft that could function as an interstellar ark, supporting a crew of 200 with extra space for expansion, on multi-year journeys at subluminal speeds to nearby star systems. [3] In 1955 Project Orion considered nuclear propulsion for spacecraft, suitable for deep space voyages.