[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Turnsky


besides, there's enough radiation in space as it is, it's not like a little itty bitty nuclear engine would do much harm, seeing as there's the largest nuclear furnace locally sitting in the heart of our system...

these people don't think, seriously.

I would imagine the concern would be possible fallout from any sort of accident close enough to the earth for debris to enter the atmosphere.  I'm not sure about dispersion rates and how concentrated it'd be (i.e. how lethal), but I'd imagine high-altitude fallout could spread quite a distance.

That and the paranoia your enemy might decide to take their little nuclear rocket and aim it at you with a timer on it.

[EtherShock]

Originally posted by Shrike
There's a very large difference between the plutonium powerpacks they use in space probes (which are extremely safe and have very low energy emissions) and a nuclear thermal rocket, which basically pours reaction mass through a nuclear reactor to generate thrust.

They're efficient, with even the most basic types having double the ISP of conventional rockets, but there's a certain justification in being leery over the technology.  If one blows up from a malfunction it'll be a big ****ing mess.

For the record, I support the use of NTRs, but then again I don't live right next to where they'd be launched . . .

It's only natural if you don't live near the launching area.

In space, none of this would matter so much. OK, we're all thinking with fission power here, right? Fusion would be much safer (when feasible) correct? In that case, I would be for NTRs.

[Nuke]

nuclear rockets are definately the way to go, its just the problem that you have to go through the atmosphere to get into space. you could probibly launch an un-fueled reactor and use railguns to launch the nuclear material into orbit to be retrieved and installed into the nuclear engine. the alternative is to set up space mining to retreave usefuill isotopes from the moon/asteroids. the catch 22 is that in order to set up space mining infrastructures you will probibly need nuclear engines. i figure ion engines could be used in the interim. ion engines cant reach escape velocity but they make orbital transfers a hell of more effietient.

[Turnsky]

well, once one moves past the earth's orbit, the prospect of using a nuclear fired engine system becomes more hopeful