Nukes & solar panels

In a message dated 3/29/01 5:41:22 PM Eastern Standard Time, cfrjlr@...
writes:

such as the Sea Launch Consortium that launches proton rockets from a
> floating platform in the Pacific. It would be hard to

FYI, Sea Launch flies Zenith, not Proton.
>>
Ok, but you got my point. If you could launch a Zenith, you could also
launch something larger with a larger platform. I'm not a nuke freak, I just
get frusterated with the progress of Chemical launchers. After the X-33
debacle, I sometimes wonder if SSTO is pie in the sky without something more
powerful than chemical reactions. Ocean launch seems to be a way to solve the
Nimby problem. There are 130 degrees along the equator of Pacific Ocean,
that's 36% of the entire Earth's circumference and it takes the space shuttle
about 32 minutes to cross the Pacific ocean along the equator while in orbit,
that sounds like enough distance and time for a manned nuclear rocket to
reach orbit safely. The Human occupants would have to be shielded from the
reactor, but the reactor wouldn't have to be completely enclosed by
shielding, only in the direction of the crew cockpit. Since no combustion is
involved it would be easier for the reactor to heat air and then heat onboard
hydrogen at higher altitudes until orbit is reached. We've put off nuclear
rocketry long enough, sooner or later after being frusterated by chemically
powered SSTO concepts we may turn to nuclear rocketry. But who knows perhaps
some version of chemical SSTO may work after all.

Tom Kalbfus