Re: Cult spacecraft Part One: The Little Spaceplane That Couldn't



Fred J. McCall wrote:
Let me give you a hint as to what's wrong with your question. Find a
number for how much overpressure something like an aircraft carrier
can stand (good luck with that one - you'll probably just have to
arbitrarily pick something). Compute how far the carrier can move in
the amount of warning time it has (good luck finding that - you'll
probably just have to pick some amount of time and some top speed).

The last one is pretty easy to figure out: http://www.navweaps.com/index_tech/tech-028.htm
Since even adding a few knots to a carrier's maximum speed is going to take a lot of extra horsepower, you can figure out the max speed within a few knots fairly easily.
Also, there is the "convoy rule" in effect here; the speed of the carrier attack group is based on the speed of the slowest ship in it.
If the carrier and its fast escort vessels decide to run away from all of the support vessels to escape a nuclear attack, they probably can indeed move out at over 30 knots.
But again, what if you target them with a "lead" in your impact point? Then they need to determine they are under attack ASAP and immediately reverse course to escape it. And the enemy might figure out that they will do that, and put a second warhead on their estimated position if they do reverse course.
For airbursts, the carrier is probably pretty survivable; the aircraft on deck will probably be rendered unflyable if not swept clean off of the deck by the blast effects and radar gear and such on the island will probable be rendered at least temporarily inoperable. But the water spray system is designed to wash fallout off of the ship, so it at least will be able to stay afloat and probably operate any aircraft that were in the hanger deck when the detonation occurred.
The effects of a subsurface detonation in proximity to the carrier are a lot more severe; not only does the hull get a walloping big shockwave sent through it, but the ship may get drenched with highly radioactive water thrown into the air by the subsurface blast, like the target ships at the Baker test were.
So can you drop a nuclear warhead into the water at supersonic speeds and have it detonate?
Yes, you indeed can; the SUBROC warhead would enter the water over its target supersonically.
Even a airburst close to the sea's surface of a large yield nuclear weapon is going to transmit a lot of its shockwave into the water and blow radioactive water all over the place in the form of a giant cloud of radioactive steam.
Given the preceding, calculate how many weapons you have to lay down
in a grid within that circle the carrier MIGHT be in. Keep in mind
the (in)accuracy of the weapons you're firing, as that will
necessitate putting them closer together than your original
calculation says you need.

Once you've done all that, calculate the total cost of all the
warheads and delivery systems required in order to try to kill a
carrier with ICBMs. See if it meets the threshold to be a worthwhile
way to try to kill carriers.

This of course relies on the fact that the warhead can't self-home after reentry. From around fifty miles up it will be able to see a lot of the sea's surface under it easily including any carrier force trying to escape it, and like our Pershing II, it might be able to use a nose-mounted radar to home on its target.
You want a great radar target?
How about a 4.5 acre steel flight deck of a Nimitz class carrier pointing straight up at the sky as you descend on it?
Screw the lifting body concept and subsurface detonation, even a 10 kT warhead coming down on a ballistic trajectory that will physically hit the carrier while going at multiple Mach numbers on its way down (to evade intercept by a Standard missile) will blow the carrier into superheated scrap metal on impact.
And this photo of incoming MX ICBM warheads show that they hit fast enough to keep glowing all the way down as their RV's ablate: http://tbn0.google.com/hosted/images/c?q=149a16d0c0ebcd4c_landing
.

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