
Aircraft Nuclear Propulsion - llambda
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_Nuclear_Propulsion
======
rdmckenzie
Context: At this point in history, the USA and USSR had aircraft fleets on
constant patrol with tanker resupply. The concept was to simultaneously
shorten the response time of strategic nuclear forces by having them "idle"
nearer the target zones than their home bases and more importantly to reduce
the potential losses of such strategic strike forces to a "bolt from the blue"
preemptive & disarming attack. In a world where the President and SAC command
would have to wait hours for B-36 & predicessor aircraft to make their way to
their targets in Russia.

There were three real issues with this project: shielding weight, landing
weight and politics. 1\. Shot down or crashing, one of these aircraft would be
a "dirty bomb" and could generate a nuclear contamination disaster. This alone
made the project risky. Remeber, during the heyday of strategic nuclear
bombing shootdowns were expected & ariplane to target assignments were made on
the basis of the expected (and dismal) survival rate of inbound bombers. Also
a single crash on US soil would have been... politically unpopular. 2\. The
lead, graphite and cement used to shield static nuclear facilities doesn't
exactly work when trying to build an airplane, which made crew shielding
dubious and reduced the loiter time of such a vehicle to the radiation
tolerance of the crew. 3\. A mich more minor issue was that of building
landing gear that could hold the weight of the reactor on landing let alone a
crash.

All that asside, a flying nuke plant is a great idea and I for one would not
be surprised to see this idea resurrected for extreme loiter duration robotic
aircraft :/

~~~
riobard
Could they use a drone instead of manned aircrafts to address point 2? So
there's no need to shield and thus saving the weight.

~~~
marcosdumay
Our computers are even more sensitive to radioactivity than our bodies.

Maybe yes with a drone based on TTL or some other "old" standard. Probably no
with CMOS... Well, with a nuclear plant on board, I guess one can generate
enough energy for a TTL computer.

~~~
Houshalter
But computers don't take up nearly as much space. You would only need to
shield that one specific spot where the computer was rather than the whole
cockpit.

~~~
lostlogin
Wouldn't you need to shield the wiring too? That stuff goes everywhere. Im not
certain on the need for this though.

~~~
eksith
Yes, every particle crossing the copper can create an anomalous signal that
can switch a 0 to 1 or visa versa. If you have enough of those, the program(s)
will eventually crash. On the processors themselves the L1/L2 caches are
vulnerable, but beyond that, the ROM could also get corrupted making hard
resets impossible even after a crash.

Fiber optic cables aren't immune to this either :
<http://misspiggy.gsfc.nasa.gov/tva/meldoc/cabass/rad.htm>

------
fintler
The guy on the other end says, "Is this Professor Feynman, of Cornell
University?"

"That's right."

"This is Mr. So-and-so from the Such-and-such Aircraft Company." It was one of
the big airplane companies in California, but unfortunately I can't remember
which one. The guy continues: "We're planning to start a laboratory on
nuclear-propelled rocket airplanes. It will have an annual budget of so-and-so
many million dollars . . ." Big numbers.

I said, "Just a moment, sir; I don't know why you're telling me all this."

"Just let me speak to you," he says; "just let me explain everything. Please
let me do it my way." So he goes on a little more, and says how many people
are going to be in the laboratory, so-and-so-many people at this level, and so
-and-somany Ph.D's at that level . . .

"Excuse me, sir," I say, "but I think you have the wrong fella."

"Am I talking to Richard Feynman, Richard P. Feynman?"

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surely_Youre_Joking,_Mr._Feynma...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surely_Youre_Joking,_Mr._Feynman)

~~~
jonmrodriguez
"Yes, but you're.."

"Would you please let me present what I have to say, sir, and then we'll
discuss it."

"All right!" I sit down and sort of close my eyes to listen to all this stuff,
all these details about this big project, and I still haven't the slightest
idea why he's giving me all this information,

Finally, when he's all finished, he says, "I'm telling you about our plans
because we want to know if you would like to be the director of the
laboratory."

"Have you really got the right fella?" I say. "I'm a professor of theoretical
physics. I'm not a rocket engineer, or an airplane engineer, or anything like
that."

"We're sure we have the right fellow."

"Where did you get my name then? Why did you decide to call me?"

"Sir, your name is on the patent for nuclear-powered, rocket-propelled
airplanes."

"Oh," I said, and I realized why my name was on the patent, and I'll have to
tell you the story. I told the man, "I'm sorry, but I would like to continue
as a professor at Cornell University."

What had happened was, during the war, at Los Alamos, there was a very nice
fella in charge of the patent office for the government, named Captain Smith.
Smith sent around a notice to everybody that said something like, "We in the
patent office would like to patent every idea you have for the United States
government, for which you are working now. Any idea you have on nuclear energy
or its application that you may think everybody knows about, everybody doesn't
know about: Just come to my office and tell me the idea."

I see Smith at lunch, and as we're walking back to the technical area, I say
to him, "That note you sent around: That's kind of crazy to have us come in
and tell you every idea."

We discussed it back and forth--by this time we're in his office-and I say,
"There are so many ideas about nuclear energy that are so perfectly obvious,
that I'd be here all day telling you stuff."

"LIKE WHAT?"

"Nothin' to it!" I say. "Example: nuclear reactor . . . under water. . water
goes in . . . steam goes out the other side ... Pshshshsht--it's a submarine.
Or: nuclear reactor ... air comes rushing in the front... heated up by nuclear
reaction ... out the back it goes ... Boom! Through the air- -it's an
airplane. Or: nuclear reactor ... you have hydrogen go through the thing ...
Zoom!--it's a rocket. Or: nuclear reactor ... only instead of using ordinary
uranium, you use enriched uranium with beryllium oxide at high temperature to
make it more efficient ... It's an electrical power plant. There's a million
ideas!" I said, as I went out the door. Nothing happened.

About three months later, Smith calls me in the office and says, "Feynman, the
submarine has already been taken. But the other three are yours."

So when the guys at the airplane company in California are planning their
laboratory, and try to find out who's an expert in rocket-propelled whatnots,
there's nothing to it: They look at who's got the patent on it!

<http://www.chem.fsu.edu/chemlab/isc3523c/feyn_surely.pdf>

~~~
fintler
But what about the dollar?! (a reference to the rest of this short story)

This entire book is an amazing read that I recommend to anyone. You can
usually find it for less than $5 at a used bookstore.

------
shabble
ObNukeRef: Project Pluto[1][2]

[1] <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Pluto>

[2] <http://www.merkle.com/pluto/pluto.html>

------
gbog
Maybe we could sleep better in such an airplane. How do they protect the crew
from radiation in a nuclear submarine? Can't they do the same in a very big
and silent plane?

~~~
ams6110
Submarines are supported by buoyancy as a result of water displacement, so
they can be a lot heavier than aircraft which are supported by lift generated
by air moving over the wings.

The noise on a modern airplane is due mostly to the 500MPH airflow outside,
not the engines. (Edit: a turbofan engine powered by nuclear-heated air would
also likely be about as noisy as one powered by burning fuel)

~~~
epochwolf
> The noise on a modern airplane is due mostly to the 500MPH airflow outside

Where are you pulling this from? Every interview I've seen with people who
have been on planes where the engines had quit talked about how quiet it got.

------
batbomb
I'be actually seen these engines in person. We did a tour for a class at INL.
They are huge, much bigger than you could fit in a 747.

------
ck2
Imagine just how much "radioactive pollution" these engines were putting out
if even the military wouldn't use them.

