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That might not be too far away - SpaceX does want to use their Starship to fly point-to-point across the globe. I suspect the noise, will make it infeasible for
by martythemaniak 7y ago
That might not be too far away - SpaceX does want to use their Starship to fly point-to-point across the globe. I suspect the noise, will make it infeasible for all but a few major destinations. They'd likely have to have a sea-based platform 20-30km away from the city, then use a floating tunnel with Tesla/BoringCo pods the rest of the way to actually get downtown.
Still, it would be pretty sweet. Go downtown, check in, take a 10 minute pod ride, get strapped into your seat (there's no washrooms, or moving around), blast off and 45 minutes later you're on the other side of the world, another 10 minute pod ride away from downtown.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- sneak 7y ago> I suspect the noise, will make it infeasible for all but a few major destinations. I think the issue will be more geopolitical than anything. Few national defense organizations will trust an ICBM heading toward "just next to (no seriously, it's fine)" one of their largest population centers, even if it is from someone they consider friendly. Not insurmountable, but definitely an uphill battle.
- derekp7 7y agoAnd yet they are perfectly content with thousands of inbound jet planes flying into all their major cities. Which could just as easily have any payload they want.
- njarboe 7y agoOr trucks.
- TheOtherHobbes 7y agoOr - in some areas at least - ships.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- sneak 7y agoI have a feeling that if any of those planes were going Mach 30 they would feel a little differently about it.
- derefr 7y agoWould planes really need to go Mach 30 to devastate a city? 9/11 could have been about planes with nukes on them.
- 3pt14159 7y agoNaw, this is what intelligence is for. It's not like these launch points aren't known in advance. Is Russia really going to lack awareness of a launch from a common civilian launch point? Plus they could always have court mandated blackout periods. World tensions heating up? Shut down landing points to anywhere 100km of Russia or you get fined.
- potiuper 7y agoMIRV throws a wrench into any "intelligence" along with a sub sitting next to that "civilian" launch point
- 3pt14159 7y agoI'm fully aware of MIRV and a number of other issues related to arms control. I'm not concerned about governments thinking a ICBM is incoming because it shows up on a radar. We have plenty of technical and social solutions to this. Nations do not just nuke a single city out of the blue.
- jacobwilliamroy 7y ago9/11 but with Rockets this time.
- the8472 7y agoHow would you avoid the TSA? Or the urge of people to arrive early lest they miss their prepaid flight and have to pay rebooking fees? I doubt it's economical to just schedule those rockets no matter how many passengers take them.
- bananabreakfast 7y agoWhat TSA? How exactly is someone going to hijack an autonomous rocket?
- the8472 7y agoThey just might blow it up as it's coming down over a city.
- catalogia 7y agoThe TSA makes people take off their shoes, but in the rest of the world that doesn't typically happen. Somehow, there aren't loads of shoebombs blowing up planes in Europe. The TSA don't do anything constructive. It's a jobs program justified through fear mongering. The supposed threat they guard against is a million times rarer than lightning.
- the8472 7y agoI don't disagree, but whatever official arguments the TSA has for existing would also apply to intercontinental missles regularly launched from american spaceports.
- hoorayimhelping 7y agoAs anyone who lived in Central Florida or the Space Coast in the 80s and 90s can tell you, sonic booms from hypersonic objects returning from orbit are no joke. It's worth putting up with once or twice a year when you know the space shuttle is returning from orbiting the planet. But I imagine most people would be pretty annoyed with constant sonic booms from rich people traveling across the globe.
- outside1234 7y agoYou forgot climate concerns. We can't be adding to the problem with even more inefficient methods of getting places.