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What was the logic for putting these in space? I might have missed it in the article but since I'm ignorant to the details of the safety of these things it seem
by rubyfan 11y ago
What was the logic for putting these in space? I might have missed it in the article but since I'm ignorant to the details of the safety of these things it seems like a dumb idea to put a reactor into an uncontrollable orbit around the earth.
- InclinedPlane 11y agoPower used to be a lot harder to come by, so there was a lot of experimentation with nuclear tech. Some of it more sensible than others. The US only experimented with one reactor before deciding it mostly wasn't worth it. The Soviets launched over thirty reactors, to power the orbital naval radar satellites they had (which effectively monitored every surface naval vessel in the world).
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- rahuldeshpande 11y agoFrom an article - Because a return signal from an ordinary target illuminated by a radar transmitter diminishes as the inverse of the fourth power of the distance, for the surveillance radar to work effectively, these satellites had to be placed in low Earth orbit. Had they used large solar panels for power, the orbit would have rapidly decayed due to drag through the upper atmosphere. Further, the satellite would have been useless in the shadow of Earth.