4 ms·

Most ICBMs are solid fueled (at least the US ones)

sidewndr46 4y ago
Yeah, the safety record of liquid fueled weapons isn't very good. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_Damascus_Titan_missile_explosion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_Damascus_Titan_missile_ex...
- Eleison23 4y ago
  Interesting article and story. I don't rightly recall ever hearing about this particular incident. I was 8; so I wonder if/when details were released to the public. You really wonder -- this would be a hugely dangerous incident and very embarrassing for the general public to find out about it, so you'd expect that the military would keep a lid on it, so to speak, for as long as possible. The cat was out of the bag by 1988, because a film was made about the incident, so it says.
  - disillusioned 4y ago
    Highly recommend reading Eric Schlosser's fantastic book Command and Control. It goes into great detail about the failings at the Damascus Incident, but also features some truly hair-raising accounts of other near-catastrophic nuclear near-misses.
    - gattr 4y ago
      Seconded. Add to that the (insane?) early SIOP, a plan for an all-out attack on the USSR with waves of nuke-armed strategic bombers. As for the Damascus accident, I'd love to watch a high-budget movie about it (preferably on the level of "Deepwater Horizon", with Mark Wahlberg to boot).
justinator 4y ago
The ones talked about in TFA are three staged, with the third stage being liquid. Can you launch an orbital solid fueled rocket? I thought that liquid (oxygen) was needed.
- pinewurst 4y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scout_(rocket_family) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scout_(rocket_family)
- 14u2c 4y ago
  US missiles are entirely solid fueled but they do not achieve orbit either. They spent short time exoatmospheric and then reenter, well, ballistically.
- chipsa 4y ago
  It's hard to get precise velocity changes with a solid fuel rocket. So must orbital class rockets have a liquid fuel stage at the end. And most rockets don't use oxygen for a propellant, because that's cryogenic, and hard to keep liquid. So called storable propellants are frequently used, especially for military rockets. That said, the most launched rocket last year was a cryogenic fueled rocket.
nradov 4y ago
Militaries may need solid fueled satellite launchers to fight future high-intensity conflicts. They are increasingly reliant on satellites for communications, navigation, reconnaissance, targeting, and weather. But anti-satellite weapons are also advancing rapidly, and we can expect satellites to be destroyed quickly once the shooting starts. So there will be a requirement to replace attrition losses by launching replacement satellites within hours.
- justinator 4y ago
  targeting Are they? The whole article was about the inertial guidance system. Seems like conflicts don't take GPS-like systems as a given. Ground to Air guidance systems use similar systems, as well as data fed by the launch site until they're close enough to their targets to lock onto things like heat signatures, etc.
  - nradov 4y ago
    Targeting in terms of detecting and maintaining a target track so that other platforms can employ weapons against it. The US Air Force is considering replacing their current fleet of E-3 AWACS aircraft with a satellite system. Obviously those satellites will be vulnerable in a conflict, so there would have to be a way to rapidly replace combat losses. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/42487/e-7-wedgetail-radar-jets-eyed-as-a-bridge-to-a-space-based-system-by-air-force https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/42487/e-7-wedgetail-ra...
- fsagx 4y ago
  The Russians have worked on this -- It was public more than 20 years ago. I would guess they (and the US too) have some capabilities to put commsats back up in an emergency with sub launch via modified SLBM. https://archive.ph/0ayQv https://archive.ph/0ayQv

Yeah, the safety record of liquid fueled weapons isn't very good. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_Damascus_Titan_missile_explosion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_Damascus_Titan_missile_ex...

Eleison23 4y ago
Interesting article and story. I don't rightly recall ever hearing about this particular incident. I was 8; so I wonder if/when details were released to the public. You really wonder -- this would be a hugely dangerous incident and very embarrassing for the general public to find out about it, so you'd expect that the military would keep a lid on it, so to speak, for as long as possible. The cat was out of the bag by 1988, because a film was made about the incident, so it says.
- disillusioned 4y ago
  Highly recommend reading Eric Schlosser's fantastic book Command and Control. It goes into great detail about the failings at the Damascus Incident, but also features some truly hair-raising accounts of other near-catastrophic nuclear near-misses.
  - gattr 4y ago
    Seconded. Add to that the (insane?) early SIOP, a plan for an all-out attack on the USSR with waves of nuke-armed strategic bombers. As for the Damascus accident, I'd love to watch a high-budget movie about it (preferably on the level of "Deepwater Horizon", with Mark Wahlberg to boot).

justinator 4y ago

The ones talked about in TFA are three staged, with the third stage being liquid. Can you launch an orbital solid fueled rocket? I thought that liquid (oxygen) was needed.

pinewurst 4y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scout_(rocket_family) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scout_(rocket_family)
14u2c 4y ago
US missiles are entirely solid fueled but they do not achieve orbit either. They spent short time exoatmospheric and then reenter, well, ballistically.
chipsa 4y ago
It's hard to get precise velocity changes with a solid fuel rocket. So must orbital class rockets have a liquid fuel stage at the end. And most rockets don't use oxygen for a propellant, because that's cryogenic, and hard to keep liquid. So called storable propellants are frequently used, especially for military rockets. That said, the most launched rocket last year was a cryogenic fueled rocket.

nradov 4y ago

Militaries may need solid fueled satellite launchers to fight future high-intensity conflicts. They are increasingly reliant on satellites for communications, navigation, reconnaissance, targeting, and weather. But anti-satellite weapons are also advancing rapidly, and we can expect satellites to be destroyed quickly once the shooting starts. So there will be a requirement to replace attrition losses by launching replacement satellites within hours.

justinator 4y ago
targeting Are they? The whole article was about the inertial guidance system. Seems like conflicts don't take GPS-like systems as a given. Ground to Air guidance systems use similar systems, as well as data fed by the launch site until they're close enough to their targets to lock onto things like heat signatures, etc.
- nradov 4y ago
  Targeting in terms of detecting and maintaining a target track so that other platforms can employ weapons against it. The US Air Force is considering replacing their current fleet of E-3 AWACS aircraft with a satellite system. Obviously those satellites will be vulnerable in a conflict, so there would have to be a way to rapidly replace combat losses. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/42487/e-7-wedgetail-radar-jets-eyed-as-a-bridge-to-a-space-based-system-by-air-force https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/42487/e-7-wedgetail-ra...
fsagx 4y ago
The Russians have worked on this -- It was public more than 20 years ago. I would guess they (and the US too) have some capabilities to put commsats back up in an emergency with sub launch via modified SLBM. https://archive.ph/0ayQv https://archive.ph/0ayQv