At 01:41 PM 8/10/2009, you wrote: >I'm crunching numbers right now, but just thought of something > >ICBM's If we were to nuke RUSSIA or visa versa, while these yes do not >get to orbit, they do get to just shy of orbital velocity, and re enter >the atmosphere, did they have all these elaborate heat shields?
I believe a lot of work on atmospheric entry (i.e. heat shielding) systems did actually start from the early days of ICBMs for this very reason. I don't think the speeds are that close to orbital speeds (one only needs to fall 3000 miles away, not 8000+), though they are high enough that the warheads must be designed to survive re-entry. There's a bit about ICBM re-entry systems on Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_reentry 73 de VK3JED / VK3IRL http://vkradio.com _______________________________________________ Sent via [email protected]. Opinions expressed are those of the author. Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb
