The Orion bomber ships were actually smaller than the 10 m exploration Orion that was supposed to be launched on a Saturn V booster. The Orion battleship was a very different design. The link you want is here: http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/realdesigns2.php#id--Project_Orion--Orion_Battleship
The Atomic Rocket Page has a good bit of information on the proposed plan
Go down to the Orion Bomber entryWarship Gallery - Atomic Rockets
www.projectrho.com
USA's "Project Cancelled"
- Thread starter Riain
- Start date
I posted the link to the Atomic Rocket page for both the Bomber and the Battleship
Warship Gallery - Atomic Rockets
RyoSaeba69
Banned
Look at this document. Pages 13 - 21 of the pdf.
Remember Brilliant Pebbles, from the late days of SDI circa 1987 ?
Well, imagine 100 000 * 300 pounds Brilliant Pebbles (kinetic ICBM killers) launched in orbit, and supported, by 18 * Orions - in 3 fleets of 6.
5500 interceptors per ship. 33 000 per fleet.
Orion fleet 1 sails in Earth orbit 1000 miles high.
Orion fleet 2 sails in GEO, 22000 miles high.
Orion fleet 3 is held in reserve behind the Moon.
Orion could do SAINT, ASAT, ABM, and FOBS altogether (satellites inspection, destruction, ICBM destruction, and "nuke bombardement from orbit").
No kidding: that was the plan in 1961. An earlier SDI - without the lasers, but linked to Orion.
Imagine, if JFK had done this instead of Apollo. Or Nixon.
Remember Brilliant Pebbles, from the late days of SDI circa 1987 ?
Well, imagine 100 000 * 300 pounds Brilliant Pebbles (kinetic ICBM killers) launched in orbit, and supported, by 18 * Orions - in 3 fleets of 6.
5500 interceptors per ship. 33 000 per fleet.
Orion fleet 1 sails in Earth orbit 1000 miles high.
Orion fleet 2 sails in GEO, 22000 miles high.
Orion fleet 3 is held in reserve behind the Moon.
Orion could do SAINT, ASAT, ABM, and FOBS altogether (satellites inspection, destruction, ICBM destruction, and "nuke bombardement from orbit").
No kidding: that was the plan in 1961. An earlier SDI - without the lasers, but linked to Orion.
Imagine, if JFK had done this instead of Apollo. Or Nixon.
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While USAF play with The Orion Battleship
RAND corp. planed BIG: the Orion DOOMSDAY weapon
in Case of nuclear War, a single 4000 tons Orion ground launch from biggest silo ever build
Once it reach the USSR, the Orion detonate it's single H-bomb
But since the payload of that Orion is around 1600 metric tons, you can imagine how big that Bomb is and it's Explosive force
This super weapon would had made this man very excited...
So was SLAM
Now how you 'test' it was the main question since if it decided to NOT follow the program what the heck can you actually do about it? While USAF play with The Orion Battleship
RAND corp. planed BIG: the Orion DOOMSDAY weapon
in Case of nuclear War, a single 4000 tons Orion ground launch from biggest silo ever build
Once it reach the USSR, the Orion detonate it's single H-bomb
But since the payload of that Orion is around 1600 metric tons, you can imagine how big that Bomb is and it's Explosive force
This super weapon would had made this man very excited...
Just as an FYI there was lot of question IF such a big bomb would actually work since at that size you have the very real chance that the majority of the 'bomb' gets blown apart before you have a good detonation sequence. Secondly, while the "plan" called for it to 'launch' it actually wouldn't go to the USSR as it didn't need to. It would effectively 'work' at sterilizing the planet if it detonated over the USSR as it would over the US. IIRC the more 'open' work showed it would blow something like a third of the atmosphere off the planet, vaporize a couple of inches of soil/water off the surface of a hemisphere and generally ensure even the cockroaches would have issues surviving the aftermath. Some stuff I've seen notes that putting that kind of a weapon on an Orion is really making it to complex and failure prone since it doesn't really NEED to be launched above the surface, (mind that helps a great deal in the overall destruction and frankly the Orion drive was the ONLY way to get it off the ground but...) but there you have it.
Something to keep in mind is that Orion had a huge number of non-technical (ie POLITICAL) issues that none of the work really address to a proper degree. Yes it had a hell of a capability but it was also very limited in that you really could only launch one once and then you had to support it in space with non-Orion systems which by it's nature Orion would take money and resources from being developed. Secondly with Orion's flying around there are no satellites or much in-space infrastructure at all since any time an Orion drive lights up near Earth most orbital space is sterilized. (In fact an Orion in orbit lighting up it's drive will have severe effects on the surface below it if you're not REALLY careful) The idea of non-proliferation and nuclear weapons treaties goes right out the window since to support Orion's you have to put into place a VERY streamlined and cost effective nuclear weapons building capability. And again you STILL have to develop another whole line of space launch systems to support Orion once it's in place and where does the money and resources for that come from?
Essentially you have to have both an Apollo like program AND Orion going on at the same time, (arguably the "Apollo" program would be more like how OTL's "Apollo" was SUPPOSED to run in being a multifunctional Earth orbital system with some ability to eventually go to the Moon rather than what we think of as Apollo but still pretty significant) and how much does all this take away from military and civilian development of systems here on Earth?
Great if you have a direct threat that you only have a few years to a decade to deal with but not so much for actual "utility" or military value in either the long or short term once you line all the pros and cons up. Heck yes I want to have it but what do you lose to get it? (Answer is pretty much everything BUT it)
Randy
Personally for the "Low End" slice of the LCS goal I kind of like just copying what the French did with their Floreal class frigates. Namely take a modified merchant hull give it a gun (for the US probably a 76mm instead of the 127mm), a couple of ASM, a Phalanx or Sea RAM, some stingers, and decent number of crew operated machine guns and auto cannon. Give it the capacity to carry a platoon or so of light infantry/marines. Provisions to say carry a small landing craft or two and the same for armed speed boats. A helicopter pad and a hangar for a medium sized helicopter.
The idea is to have a very cheap design that has low manning requirements and operating cost for low threat theaters. Things like say anti piracy patrols (such as those off of Somalia. For the most part you don't need very much when at most you're fighting a handful of guys with RPGs and speed boats), flag showings in low threat theaters (Such as the Caribbean and parts of Africa ) where the odds of them facing large well equipped forces and humanitarian operations (perhaps build them with a large area that can be rapidly turned into a small hospital in the event of say a earthquake abroad), assisting in the evacuation of US citizens after natural disasters and civil wars, and perhaps using their small troop carrying complement and helicopter to assist in Spec Ops raids on say terrorist/militant groups in area's where it's unlikely anyone is going to be threatening them with modern cruise missiles or combat aircraft (such as say launching raids on Boko Haram in Nigeria and other countries where their governments are either asking for help or at least looking the other way intentionally). They could also be used for training at sea new officers and enlisted men allowing more capable craft to be focused elsewhere.
The idea being that you build a small number of a very cheap design for low threat theaters allowing much more expensive and much more capable ships (such as the Arleigh Burkes and Ticonderoga's) focus on dealing with more serious threats. Ideally it saves you a good deal of wear and tear on the more expensive vessels and allow them to be better focused where their capabilities are more needed.
For the anti piracy ops I kind of like the idea of the ships being able to modularly swap out the large high end ASM's for a much larger number of much smaller missiles (probably modified ATGM like the Javelin or Hellfire) for taking out large numbers of lightly armed small combatants (such as say pirate speed boats attempting to attack a foreign merchant ship).
Similarly I also like the idea of procuring a small number of dedicated Surface to Surface warfare corvettes/missile boats for area's like the Persian Gulf (against Iranian Swarm attacks) or the South China sea. The idea for these would be for them to operate alongside Aegis equipped destroyers or cruisers (like the Arleigh Burkes or Ticonderoga's) with the Aegis ships focusing on air defense and largely focusing their missile stores on SAMs to protect the corvette from air attack or anti missile work to protect itself and the corvette from missile attacks. I'm thinking for the Surface to Surface Corvette it would have the modular capability of either carrying a smallish number of high end large cruise missiles for dealing with larger opponents or a much much larger number of much smaller missiles (once again probably some variant of ATGM like the Hellfire or Javelin) for use against projected swarm attacks of Iranian smaller attack boats of various types. For the armament probably go with the aforementioned modular either the "High end large ASM missiles" or the Low End (larger numbers of anti boat missiles with say a 57mm or 76mm main gun, a Phalanx or Sea Ram, some Stingers, and a number of auto cannon/heavy machine guns (either remotely operated or directly crew manned). How many converted ATGM (like Hellfires or Javelin or the newer Griffin) could you theoretically fit on a craft the size of the old German Gepard class or Israeli Saar 4 instead of their large cruise missiles.
The idea is to have a very cheap design that has low manning requirements and operating cost for low threat theaters. Things like say anti piracy patrols (such as those off of Somalia. For the most part you don't need very much when at most you're fighting a handful of guys with RPGs and speed boats), flag showings in low threat theaters (Such as the Caribbean and parts of Africa ) where the odds of them facing large well equipped forces and humanitarian operations (perhaps build them with a large area that can be rapidly turned into a small hospital in the event of say a earthquake abroad), assisting in the evacuation of US citizens after natural disasters and civil wars, and perhaps using their small troop carrying complement and helicopter to assist in Spec Ops raids on say terrorist/militant groups in area's where it's unlikely anyone is going to be threatening them with modern cruise missiles or combat aircraft (such as say launching raids on Boko Haram in Nigeria and other countries where their governments are either asking for help or at least looking the other way intentionally). They could also be used for training at sea new officers and enlisted men allowing more capable craft to be focused elsewhere.
The idea being that you build a small number of a very cheap design for low threat theaters allowing much more expensive and much more capable ships (such as the Arleigh Burkes and Ticonderoga's) focus on dealing with more serious threats. Ideally it saves you a good deal of wear and tear on the more expensive vessels and allow them to be better focused where their capabilities are more needed.
For the anti piracy ops I kind of like the idea of the ships being able to modularly swap out the large high end ASM's for a much larger number of much smaller missiles (probably modified ATGM like the Javelin or Hellfire) for taking out large numbers of lightly armed small combatants (such as say pirate speed boats attempting to attack a foreign merchant ship).
Similarly I also like the idea of procuring a small number of dedicated Surface to Surface warfare corvettes/missile boats for area's like the Persian Gulf (against Iranian Swarm attacks) or the South China sea. The idea for these would be for them to operate alongside Aegis equipped destroyers or cruisers (like the Arleigh Burkes or Ticonderoga's) with the Aegis ships focusing on air defense and largely focusing their missile stores on SAMs to protect the corvette from air attack or anti missile work to protect itself and the corvette from missile attacks. I'm thinking for the Surface to Surface Corvette it would have the modular capability of either carrying a smallish number of high end large cruise missiles for dealing with larger opponents or a much much larger number of much smaller missiles (once again probably some variant of ATGM like the Hellfire or Javelin) for use against projected swarm attacks of Iranian smaller attack boats of various types. For the armament probably go with the aforementioned modular either the "High end large ASM missiles" or the Low End (larger numbers of anti boat missiles with say a 57mm or 76mm main gun, a Phalanx or Sea Ram, some Stingers, and a number of auto cannon/heavy machine guns (either remotely operated or directly crew manned). How many converted ATGM (like Hellfires or Javelin or the newer Griffin) could you theoretically fit on a craft the size of the old German Gepard class or Israeli Saar 4 instead of their large cruise missiles.
For a Cold War era insane US "Doomsday Device" I kind of like the idea of a Teller device (basically a nuclear weapon so large it's completely non portable and is more of a facility then a bomb) salted with as much cobalt as possible. I think even with 60's tech with enough money and effort (and from the start planning for it not to be portable) the US could probably relatively easily create a device of at least a couple Gigatons.While USAF play with The Orion Battleship
RAND corp. planed BIG: the Orion DOOMSDAY weapon
in Case of nuclear War, a single 4000 tons Orion ground launch from biggest silo ever build
Once it reach the USSR, the Orion detonate it's single H-bomb
But since the payload of that Orion is around 1600 metric tons, you can imagine how big that Bomb is and it's Explosive force
This super weapon would had made this man very excited...
For added zest build/assemble the device on a particularly weak spot above the Yellowstone Super Caldera. The goal would be for the nuke to hopefully set off the Super Volcano and add a little zest to the end of the world.
marathag
Banned
A bunch of tiny bomblets makes far less EMP than say, Starfish Prime
Bomblets were between 0.15kt and 5 kt, so varies from 0.115–0.5% of the total weapon yield of that, as Gamma radiation
That's really low on the Volts/Meter scale
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RyoSaeba69
Banned
This is what happen when "team space nerds" hijack a thread.
Surely enough, a combination of a gigaton nuke and Yellowstone would radically solve Global Warming.
What... the... fuck.
Surely enough, a combination of a gigaton nuke and Yellowstone would radically solve Global Warming.
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The Cold War produce allot strange and insane stuff
Lucky JFK and McNamara terminated those programs fast
Back to topic
Another US project canceled was the Atomic powert Bomber.
The Idea it could fly with out refueling all over the world and deliver Atomic weapon to target.
But the Idea had issue, serious issues:
One - radioactivity the crew and ground crew had to face, LeMay wanted to take Pilots from retirement to fly those things.
Then they found a idea to shield the crew better by use of Zip Fuel, that's toxic hydro-boron compounds like methyldecaborane
what adding chemical warfare to radioactivity, the ground crew had to face, but since they use remote control machines (waldos)
was this consider a "minor" problem
Two - Ground operation, now using Zip Fuel for take off and landing gave other problem
The residue of Zip fuel are extreme toxic and do gruesome thing to jet engines and environment
and during takeoff and landing happen most accidents with Aircraft
means that Airbase had to be isolated from rest of the World
Convair proposed a clever solution, a ultra large aircraft carrier for Nuclear bomber.
This would solve most problems including disposal of used hardware by dumping overboard like into the Mariana Trench
But LeMay opposed, because now the bomber would at US NAVY, not SAC,
the Navy not wanted operate a Nuclear power aircraft on Carrier
and McNamara not wanted god dam thing at all and canceled it so fast as possible
Lucky JFK and McNamara terminated those programs fast
Back to topic
Another US project canceled was the Atomic powert Bomber.
The Idea it could fly with out refueling all over the world and deliver Atomic weapon to target.
But the Idea had issue, serious issues:
One - radioactivity the crew and ground crew had to face, LeMay wanted to take Pilots from retirement to fly those things.
Then they found a idea to shield the crew better by use of Zip Fuel, that's toxic hydro-boron compounds like methyldecaborane
what adding chemical warfare to radioactivity, the ground crew had to face, but since they use remote control machines (waldos)
was this consider a "minor" problem
Two - Ground operation, now using Zip Fuel for take off and landing gave other problem
The residue of Zip fuel are extreme toxic and do gruesome thing to jet engines and environment
and during takeoff and landing happen most accidents with Aircraft
means that Airbase had to be isolated from rest of the World
Convair proposed a clever solution, a ultra large aircraft carrier for Nuclear bomber.
This would solve most problems including disposal of used hardware by dumping overboard like into the Mariana Trench
But LeMay opposed, because now the bomber would at US NAVY, not SAC,
the Navy not wanted operate a Nuclear power aircraft on Carrier
and McNamara not wanted god dam thing at all and canceled it so fast as possible
Anyone remembers "Project Thor", aka "rods from god"? Guess who's apparently thinking about it again...
This is what happen when "team space nerds" hijack a thread.
What... the... fuck.
Surely enough, a combination of a gigaton nuke and Yellowstone would radically solve Global Warming.
Mostly by removing the "Global" bit from existing in the first place.
Well with orbital lift being cheaper than ever before it was only a matter of time
Closed-cycle nuclear rocket and jet engines are still a technical problem today, but open-cycle motors were demonstrated in the 60s. Of course, spewing fission fragments out the back of your spaceship is fine but it's a big problem when you're in atmosphere. I think the only practical nuclear-powered aircraft that SAC could have come up with at the time would have used electrical power from a reactor to drive electric motors and propellers in the wings, so you would have a slow, propeller-driven missile carrier that could remain airborne for extended periods. This may be fine in the 1950s, but air-launched missiles are not well developed and SSBNs that can do the same thing began entering service in the 1960s. The fundamental problem with nuclear aircraft engines is that they have a poor power-to-weight ratio compared to jet turbines
Feasibilities aside, what really scares me on stuff like Orion, was getting the nukes up there. Seriously, one single cargo rocket loaded with nukes blows up on take off, or some 1000s of feet above, or the engine just fails mid-climb...
Reminds me of "The Colder War" lovecraftian story where the nuclear powered B36 shows up. In story the Air force paired it with a air deployable version of SLAM (or Project Pluto itself a massive nuclear armed and nuclear powered cruise missile emitting vast amounts of radiation just by flying) as the US response to the Soviets apparently somehow getting their hands on a comatose Cthulhu and sticking him in a massive concrete bunker in the Ukraine. The US counter response plan was to send up a couple dozen nuclear powered B36's each equipped with multiple very large "Project Pluto" type cruise missiles. I think the author/narrator mentions that the idea is to simultaneously hit the Bunker with several gigatons of nuclear might. And the USAF isn't actually sure that will so much as slow Cthulu down if he wakes.
The Narrator mentions seeming them on a airbase as a kid. They're described as being so incredibly radioactive that when not in use they're cordoned off like a mile from literally anything else on air bases (with no one within the cordon unless absolutely neccesary) with the corden consisting of automated auto cannon sentry turrets, land mines, barbed wire, and various heavily armed guards.
There were a number of issues with using bomb even that tiny in quick succession, (one a minute IIRC) in orbital space and satellite technology was such that it took till the mid-70s to get to a point where the satellites could probably survive in such an environment. Don't get me wrong you essentially have large armored (and likely manned) "satellites" in an Orion-drive world rather than many smaller satellites because of the nature of the system but you also have likely dozens of Orion drive spacecraft flying all over the place in short order and the havoc was recognized early on. (Since there essentially WAS no space infrastructure at the time it didn't matter but as most of the people working on it were somewhat "space travel" oriented they went ahead and figured the issues anyway and tried to come up with solutions. The sad part was the folks they needed to talk to about solving some of the main issues, those developing chemical type orbital rockets, they weren't allowed to talk to)
Something to keep in mind is that at it's core the Orion drive is still a possible weapon which means the there is no way the Soviets are not going to have that capability as well and if we get the "Star Fleet" the Air Force wanted then US and USSR "Space Boomers" will be a thing. (There's a short story about that in some book I read a blurb about I think at Atomic Rockets but can't find atm) So tensions will be much higher as will be suspicion so expect a lot more capable planetary missions but a lot more restrictive, (likely 'accompanied by "escorting" national WarOrion's to keep an eye on the expedition and the "other guys") and probably fewer and further apart than one would think given who has 'priority' for propulsion units.
Strap in it gets wilder
Fairly tame: My notes for an alternate "origin" story for the Niven/Pournelle "CoDominium" universe involves an "Icarus Falling" scenario where Nixon and Khrushchev agree the world must be saved but quite obviously it is a world where the US and USSR must remain the dominant powers. The rapid building and launching of several Orion Drive ships saves the world while a great effort is made to build an economical surface to orbit launch system. Pretty soon Orion Drives are assigned to CD Navy ship only and civilian ships use various fission and finally fusion drives to get around.
Wilder: Some background, Orion type drives are technically known as "Externally Pulsed Plasma Propulsion" systems. As has been noted before they are known to be the only plausible drive that could be built in a relatively short order and used against a major threat to Humanity on Earth. There remains an issue with launching them from the surface of the Earth though and a paper on EPPP (HERE) that discuss an asteroid/comet defense concept called GABRIEL. It's a rather small Orion-Drive vehicle but being automated it has some advantages but one is NOT being easy to get off the Earth in a timely manner. So various methods are described that could be used to launch a GABRIEL interceptor.
1) The Atomic Verne Gun. Take a deep shaft, (salt mine, old mineral mine, or new construction) seal it and put a couple kiloton nuclear weapon at the bottom. Fill the shaft half way with a 'reaction mass', we'll use water and top it with a shaft filling cap on top of which is GABRIEL. If you need GABRIEL in orbit wait for the right moment and light off the nuke, which will vaporized the reaction mass and push the cap and payload out the end of the tube at a velocity able to bring GABRIEL to a point in space where it can use it's own drive to circularize its orbit and begin its mission. (Note if you've done this right then there is a secondary cap and braking system that will ensure none of the radioactive materials from the launch leave the launch tube.
2) Loft GABRIEL with more conventional chemical or solid boosters to a high altitude where it can then use its own drive to push itself into orbit. Problem though, any plausible system is going to leave GABRIEL low enough that contamination and pulse effects are going to be severe. Answer? Don't use atomic bombs for this portion of the flight AND off-load them to a "beamed" pulse unit system based on the ground. And change the "pulse units" from very low yield nuclear weapons to a category of explosives known as "Super High Explosives" which can reach near nuclear levels albeit very small, low yield nuclear levels. Sound too good to be true? Well it kind of is. While SHE as it is called is known and has been worked with it suffers from issues that make it useless for most military work such as spontaneously exploding after a few months in storage or decomposing within a year of manufacture into a toxic and volatile goo as a few examples. Which is not actually a problem if you use them soon after they are made. Such as in specially designed shells to be fired at the thrust-plate of a Orion Drive spacecraft which explode then just short of impact with the plate and acting like a standard pulse unit.
But you need to deliver these unit to the Orion while in flight and at a pretty high rate as well. Let me digress a moment … A 37mm rotary cannon on a light chassis? How cute... How about a 4,6, or 8 barrel version mounted on a solid land base but using modified 5" Naval guns?
This is the 'beamed' propulsion part of the concept.3) Similar to the above but instead of SHE shells you use a very powerful laser array and the "oil" sprayers on the Orion Pusher Plate as a type of laser ablation pulsed propulsion system. Again the GABRIEL is launched to an altitude where the ground array can pick it up and track it and fire pulsed laser bursts which vaporize the 'oil' coating and provide the impulse shocks for propulsion.
Needless to say Orion Drives (Or EP3 as it's known today) has a lot of interesting permutations and side-effects that can be quite fascinating to explore.
Randy
To be honest and sincere the majority they terminated were studies and some advanced concept and testing planning. Those working on the programs were wall aware there was a point where they couldn't go any further without a significant and concise policy review and decisions which was always going to be in the hands of the civilian segment of government. And for the most part they also didn't downplay the horrors and defects of their own work with the SLAM people essentially saying that proceeding with the project would alienate just about every European and Asian allied nation and be such a radical shift in nuclear war policy as to be akin to embracing a "doomsday weapon" type planning which was neither defensive nor offensive in nature but similar to straight and simple blackmail of the world as a full time strategy.
That's kind of obviously not a viable international policy position to try and justify or undertake.
The closed cycle nuclear jets reached the testing phase while the open cycle, (other than SLAM's ramjet) did not. The work on the open cycle jet engines fed into the NERVA rocket development which is why they quickly found a cladding material that almost totally eliminated the fission fragments from the exhaust. By the end of the program NERVA had zero fragment release under all operational condition and run modes. Oddly while the NERVA program stuck far to long with graphite the aircraft program did the preliminary work on ceramic and metal reactor systems that was later championed for the second generation NERVA designs.
The idea of a "Nuclear Logistics Carrier Aircraft" (if I'm remembering the name right) eventually centered around essentially leasing the SORO Princess flying boat as the test bed but it didn't pan out. The electric props would have been more efficient in cruise but they had/have issues with throttle response and need 'boost' power sources (battery or capacitor banks) to allow for power surges when needed. They are also speed limited, and though that is less an issue for a "missile bus" it is was a problem due to various logistics and operational time-to-patrol area concerns. Really by the time the Air Force dropped the concept they were just getting into long-range air launched missiles and all previous work was either for direct bombing, (gravity bombs) or short range missiles so jet speed to and from the target area were seen as critical. The other killer for a missile carrier was of course subs are way stealthier and harder to detect so the airborne missile carrier never made enough sense to pursue.
And you get at most some slight scattering of nuclear material that's mildly radioactive and easily cleaned up in the very wort case scenario. Mostly you get a lot of large chunks of easily cleaned up 'pulse unit' parts with close to zero effect on the environment. You get more 'damaging' material out of of the vehicle than you do the pulse units by design As shipped they are not even inside the HE explosive lens system and are essentially just solid lumps of a very dense and tough metal.
Let me point out that they will NOT explode there's just no way to cause a chain reaction in shipment. Now when launching and Orion drive from Earth the pulse units on-board ARE live but you also have a very robust ship and storage method to overcome before you can get to most of the pulse units. Nuclear weapons which are designed to explode a LOT easier than a pulse unit have been dropped, burned, and blown up and we haven't had an unplanned detonation as of yet so you need to keep in mind the pulse units are design to be very robust and very reliable over and above how actual weapons are designed.
Loved that story and wished for a sequel
("A weakly God like entity"... wow) Just one correction, the NB-36's and SLAM's he saw as a kid had never been flown and Nellis is where they were 'on-alert'. He in fact mentions waling right up to the cordon and lookin at the bombers and weapons with 'some unease' and noting that ONE and only ONE training aircraft that could only operate out of a remote airbase in Alaska had every gone 'live' and IT was the one nobody could get near. The reason for the cordon WAS because these were the 'alert' birds not because they were radioactive... Yet. The autocannons and mind fields are clearly marked and currently turned off for the airshow but yes that was also a rather disturbing scene he conjured up there Randy