Amara Graps wrote:
> That stuff can remain in orbit for a long time too. (years and decades)
Ten years ago I was in a Plowshares engineering group.
We were looking at ways of using the newly-idle cold-war
era military equipment for other purposes, since we could
buy the stuff at firesale prices in 1991, right at the end of
Papa Bush's administration. One of the most tempting
items was the submarine launched missiles, no longer
needed for carrying nukes. (Our group name was
borrowed from the bible: "...they shall beat their swords
to plowshares...")
With most of the sophisticated and ruinously expensive
guidance removed we could buy them for 10 million US
clams. The missiles have three solid motor stages, the final
motor being a cylindrical device that goes up thru the center
of the equipment section. We calculated that if we removed
all the military gear, we could give a wealthy thrillseeker
a few orbits, assuming she was not too heavy, i.e. less than
about 75 kg. We called it the Bill Gates Express, or BGE.
Balance of the toroidal shaped payload section was
problematic, however, for we worried that if the astronaut
decided to move to another position for whatever reason,
or even wet his pants or lost significant mass sweating or
barfing, for instance, the CG of the final stage would go
slightly off centerline.
Without the sophisticated guidance, the final stage could turn
pi radians in a lazy arc, get pointed fiery end first, spraying
all the solid fuel products of combustion (iron and aluminum
slag and various other crud) directly into orbit. This would
spread in a deadly cloud, perhaps damaging or destroying
most or all low-orbitting assets.
We decided we would not risk being named as the
dozen rocket scientists who ended the space age. spike
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