4 ms·
A train doesn't typically have explosive fuel, which renders it a pretty poor weapon.
by duaneb 13y ago
A train doesn't typically have explosive fuel, which renders it a pretty poor weapon.
- ajuc 13y agoDon't underestimate kinetic energy of a train going 340 meters per second.
- dedward 13y agoSure.. but you can't hijack it, redirect it to another location, then crash it into a populated area. You could perhaps... stop it? And if you really want to cause havoc messing with trains, you go for cargo trains filled with hundreds of thousands of tons of toxic chemicals.
- ajuc 13y agoYeah, I just meant energy is not the reason trains aren't used as weapons.
- T-hawk 13y agoThis sort of rational sensibility isn't going to stop the TSA from power-grabbing and mission-creeping their way into any new transportation system. They'll get their tendrils in the pie, sure as the sunrise. So will a million other government bureaucracies.
- Florin_Andrei 13y ago> Don't underestimate kinetic energy of a train going 340 meters per second and then plowing into a strawberry field near Coalinga. Yeah, that's "a lot" of damage.
- UnFleshedOne 13y agoDepending on the train, you could level a downtown of a small city: http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/two-more-bodies-recovered-from-quebec-train-derailment-site-1.1368133 http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/two-more-bodies-recovered-from-...
- revelation 13y agoIsn't the point that these things do not have much kinetic energy at all? The whole scheme wouldn't make sense if you still had to invest the same amount of power as for a conventional train.
- SlyShy 13y agoKinetic energy = 1/2 m * v^2. Hyperloop trains wouldn't have "much" less energy, because the scaling factor on velocity is so high that your savings on train weight don't mean much. You are right that it would take less power.
- ajuc 13y agoSavings would be on the air friction, and the power you need to overcome it along the way.
- marssaxman 13y ago...which can't be aimed at anything but the train station...
- a-priori 13y agoYou'd be surprised. Just a week and a half ago ago a large section of Lac-Mégantic, a town east of Montreal, Quebec, was levelled by an unattended train that started rolling in the middle of the night. It was carrying a large load of oil, which ignited when the train derailed in the middle of the town. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lac-M%C3%A9gantic_derailment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lac-M%C3%A9gantic_derailment