4 ms·
> THOR engaged the targets and knocked them out of the sky using its non-kinetic, speed-of-light microwave pulses. Microwaves dont travel at the speed of light
by binarymax 3y ago
> THOR engaged the targets and knocked them out of the sky using its non-kinetic, speed-of-light microwave pulses.
Microwaves dont travel at the speed of light. Did they mean line of sight?
Edit - well guess I was wrong!
- doctoboggan 3y agoWhy wouldn't they? They are just EM waves. "Light" is used colloquially for the visible spectrum but microwaves could be considered light waves
- krapp 3y agoMicrowaves do travel at the speed of light, all electromagnetic radiation does.
- phendrenad2 3y ago> Microwaves dont travel at the speed of light Yes, they do, microwaves are just a wavelength of light.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- tasseff 3y agoYou might have been colloquially correct. Microwaves travel at the speed of light, but my microwave that heats up a Hot Pocket can't. :-)
- jakeinspace 3y agoThey’ll work in a pinch against a drone idling below your kitchen window.
- ared38 3y agoYou are actually correct. The speed of light you always hear about is the speed of EM radiation in a perfect vacuum. In a medium such as the atmosphere, the pulse doesn't travel as fast. The slowdown depends on the refractive index, which itself depends on the frequency of the wave -- longer wavelengths have lower indices. This means that microwaves will move the tiniest bit faster than light through the atmosphere.