Ontopic Mission to Uranus

pseudo sci/scifi question

So say you have a space battle going on
Ships all flying around pew pew pew-in at each other
When the pews hit a ship, they explode or are damaged
What happens when one of those pews misses?
You have a large bolt of energy lobbed from a flying space craft. Does it just keep going forever?
Would it be affected by gravity? Like pulled into permanent orbit around a moon or planet?
Or does it just dissipate over time?

Please speculate wildly
Unless it's a cohesive thing, like a torpedo, it should just dissipate.
 
depends what the pews are made of. Are they lasers? If so, they have a diffraction constant and will spread out into a cone so big it doesnt matter pretty soon. What if they pews are something more physical though, like plasma. Even in a poor thermo environment like space, plasma is going to cool over time.

Everything is affected by gravity, so yes.
My pews are made mostly of air, with a little methane thrown in for flavor.
 
I think when The Expanse was mentioned, it was referring to books. Could be wrong, as I don’t read.

In the first season of the TV show, during one of the battles, some of the ships appeared to be using guns that shot a solid projectile. That one dude got his head taken off by a cannonball, and it appears as though smaller rounds were perforating the ship.

I’m likely also wrong on that too though.
 
SpaceX spaced out on communicating with ESA about 1 in 1000 chance of collision with ESA satellite.

Doesn't fill me with good feelings for the rest of the Starlink system.


to be fair, the verge is a sensationalist piece of shit. Here's an article that identifies the specific technical fault:

Our Starlink team last exchanged an email with the Aeolus operations team on August 28, when the probability of collision was only in the 2.2e-5 range (or 1 in 50k), well below the 1e-4 (or 1 in 10k) industry standard threshold and 75 times lower than the final estimate. At that point, both SpaceX and ESA determined a maneuver was not necessary. Then, the US Air Force's updates showed the probability increased to 1.69e-3 (or more than 1 in 10k) but a bug in our on-call paging system prevented the Starlink operator from seeing the follow on correspondence on this probability increase—SpaceX is still investigating the issue and will implement corrective actions. However, had the Starlink operator seen the correspondence, we would have coordinated with ESA to determine the best approach with their continuing with their maneuver or our performing a maneuver.
The early articles kept saying stuff like "spacex refuses to move satellite", making it appear like willful refusal. That aint what happened. For lack of a better term, it was a software error. Hard to believe someone didnt pick up a phone though and say "hey, our shit might crash into your shit, check your email"
 
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to be fair, the verge is a sensationalist piece of shit. Here's an article that identifies the specific technical fault:

Our Starlink team last exchanged an email with the Aeolus operations team on August 28, when the probability of collision was only in the 2.2e-5 range (or 1 in 50k), well below the 1e-4 (or 1 in 10k) industry standard threshold and 75 times lower than the final estimate. At that point, both SpaceX and ESA determined a maneuver was not necessary. Then, the US Air Force's updates showed the probability increased to 1.69e-3 (or more than 1 in 10k) but a bug in our on-call paging system prevented the Starlink operator from seeing the follow on correspondence on this probability increase—SpaceX is still investigating the issue and will implement corrective actions. However, had the Starlink operator seen the correspondence, we would have coordinated with ESA to determine the best approach with their continuing with their maneuver or our performing a maneuver.
The early articles kept saying stuff like "spacex refuses to move satellite", making it appear like willful refusal. That aint what happened. For lack of a better term, it was a software error. Hard to believe someone didnt pick up a phone though and say "hey, our shit might crash into your shit, check your email"
That doesn't make for good Elon hate though...
 
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to be fair, the verge is a sensationalist piece of shit. Here's an article that identifies the specific technical fault:

Our Starlink team last exchanged an email with the Aeolus operations team on August 28, when the probability of collision was only in the 2.2e-5 range (or 1 in 50k), well below the 1e-4 (or 1 in 10k) industry standard threshold and 75 times lower than the final estimate. At that point, both SpaceX and ESA determined a maneuver was not necessary. Then, the US Air Force's updates showed the probability increased to 1.69e-3 (or more than 1 in 10k) but a bug in our on-call paging system prevented the Starlink operator from seeing the follow on correspondence on this probability increase—SpaceX is still investigating the issue and will implement corrective actions. However, had the Starlink operator seen the correspondence, we would have coordinated with ESA to determine the best approach with their continuing with their maneuver or our performing a maneuver.
The early articles kept saying stuff like "spacex refuses to move satellite", making it appear like willful refusal. That aint what happened. For lack of a better term, it was a software error. Hard to believe someone didnt pick up a phone though and say "hey, our shit might crash into your shit, check your email"
Literally all of that was covered in the article.

Also, initially SpaceX determined there was no need to move their shit. If they have such shitty communication software that they can't see follow up communication then that is their official stance on the matter.

It's not like all of this was over the course of one day either, it took a week to go from "this probably won't be a problem" to "oh God, oh fuck!"
What engineer or manager doesn't follow up on a project like that for a week?
 
Got to see the space shuttle discovery the other weekend up close

To add a little perspective, each of those three main nozzles has the following specs

3 main engines
space shuttle main engine (RS-25)
2,279 kN each in vacuum thrust capability
2.4M nozzle diameter

Total thrust: 6837 kN

And what we are about to put up that will power SpaceX Starship has the following specs:

43 raptor engines
1,900 kN each in vacuum
1.7M nozzle

Total thrust: 81700 kN

Slightly smaller nozzle size and thrust.... but forty three of them! Imagine standing where I am, in front of the absolutely incomprehensibly huge space shuttle engine nozzles, and multiply that by 14.

Aerospace development is amazing.

 
Got to see the space shuttle discovery the other weekend up close

To add a little perspective, each of those three main nozzles has the following specs

3 main engines
space shuttle main engine (RS-25)
2,279 kN each in vacuum thrust capability
2.4M nozzle diameter

Total thrust: 6837 kN

And what we are about to put up that will power SpaceX Starship has the following specs:

43 raptor engines
1,900 kN each in vacuum
1.7M nozzle

Total thrust: 81700 kN

Slightly smaller nozzle size and thrust.... but forty three of them! Imagine standing where I am, in front of the absolutely incomprehensibly huge space shuttle engine nozzles, and multiply that by 14.

Aerospace development is amazing.


"Daddy, why are there lines in the cement?". j/k Very cool man - thanks for including the spec and mathes. *Cute kid.
 
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man, the kids were a nightmare that day though. If there was a spacecraft about to lift off to another planet i think i might have put the younger on it and run away.

She was just hungry hungry hungry though, not her fault.
 
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Got to see the space shuttle discovery the other weekend up close

To add a little perspective, each of those three main nozzles has the following specs

3 main engines
space shuttle main engine (RS-25)
2,279 kN each in vacuum thrust capability
2.4M nozzle diameter

Total thrust: 6837 kN

And what we are about to put up that will power SpaceX Starship has the following specs:

43 raptor engines
1,900 kN each in vacuum
1.7M nozzle

Total thrust: 81700 kN

Slightly smaller nozzle size and thrust.... but forty three of them! Imagine standing where I am, in front of the absolutely incomprehensibly huge space shuttle engine nozzles, and multiply that by 14.

Aerospace development is amazing.


Is that at Air&Space?