View Poll Results: Did NASA Accidentally “Nuke” Jupiter?
Yes.
3
8.11%
Maybe. I'm not sure.
8
21.62%
No.
15
40.54%
It was not an accident. They did it on purpose.
3
8.11%
I don't care. I just like to vote in polls.
5
13.51%
This poll sucks!
3
8.11%
Voters: 37. You may not vote on this poll
Did NASA Accidentally “Nuke” Jupiter?
04-11-07, 01:40 AM
#1
Did NASA Accidentally “Nuke” Jupiter?
04-11-07, 02:05 AM
#4
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What van der Worp had suggested, in terms of Galileo, was merely a variant on the now well-known design of the “Fat Boy” plutonium nuclear weapon used against Nagasaki at the end of World War II -- an “implosion” plutonium reaction (below).
In order to bring the sub-critical pieces of plutonium-239 together in a bomb fast enough for a catastrophic fission reaction to take place, in the original Los Alamos design Seth Neddermeyer (one of the Manhattan Project scientists), following on an idea by Richard Tolman at CalTech in 1943, began working on a novel but almost impossibly difficult idea (in 1943) for smashing plutonium pieces together in mere millionths of a second. Such a device was called an “implosion mechanism,” and became the key to the success of the plutonium bomb. At its simplest, it consisted of several layers of carefully shaped high explosives, wrapped around the central sub-critical masses of plutonium (below). When triggered, the resulting high energy explosive shock waves (below, right) drove these plutonium pieces closer together in a highly compressed, spherical configuration -- resulting in a sudden transformation of the many plutonium pieces into a single “supercritical” mass … and a resulting runaway nuclear explosion.
In order to bring the sub-critical pieces of plutonium-239 together in a bomb fast enough for a catastrophic fission reaction to take place, in the original Los Alamos design Seth Neddermeyer (one of the Manhattan Project scientists), following on an idea by Richard Tolman at CalTech in 1943, began working on a novel but almost impossibly difficult idea (in 1943) for smashing plutonium pieces together in mere millionths of a second. Such a device was called an “implosion mechanism,” and became the key to the success of the plutonium bomb. At its simplest, it consisted of several layers of carefully shaped high explosives, wrapped around the central sub-critical masses of plutonium (below). When triggered, the resulting high energy explosive shock waves (below, right) drove these plutonium pieces closer together in a highly compressed, spherical configuration -- resulting in a sudden transformation of the many plutonium pieces into a single “supercritical” mass … and a resulting runaway nuclear explosion.
Something's been triggered, all right.
Last edited by Shazam; 04-11-07 at 02:07 AM.
04-11-07, 02:17 AM
#5
DVD Talk Hero
Ah yes, Richard C. Hoagland, the guy that sees faces on Mars. Considering that the idea comes from him and his ilk (and cites being on "Coast to Coast AM" as support 
), I'll take it with an enormous, gaseous grain of salt.
), I'll take it with an enormous, gaseous grain of salt.
04-11-07, 04:42 AM
#6
DVD Talk Platinum Edition
Originally Posted by grundle
04-11-07, 07:24 AM
#8
DVD Talk Legend
04-11-07, 08:10 AM
#10
DVD Talk Hero
They nuked Jupiter after staging the moon landing, covering up the Face on Mars and suppressing all the astronaut UFO sightings.
What will they do next?
What will they do next?
04-11-07, 08:37 AM
#11
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Originally Posted by crazyronin
Since it wasn't enough to reach critical mass...I would say no.
sqrt(10/0.14) = 8.5
So if we increase the density 8.5 times we'll get a critical mass. Of course to get a supercritical mass needed for a nuclear explosion requires at least double that. so we have to increase the density a mere 17 times. That's a slight problem since even modern nuclear devices using shaped charges creating megabars of pressure and shaped cores specifically designed to aid compression only increase Pu density up to around 5 times. 4kg is considered the minmium needed for a modern nuclear device, and that's highly purified weapons grade Pu-239, you would need a few more kg if using Pu-238.
So what is this "alpha state" nonsense that only requires 30 kilobars of pressure?
First off all the "alpha state" doesn't mean the plutonium is going nuclear, which the article implies. Pu has 6 solid phases depending on pressure and temperature, so it just means the metal is changing it's crystal structure to the most dense alpha phase.
The phase change is only critical when you have a linear implosion device that uses the phase change to create a supercritical mass. Linear devices are carefully designed with explosives to reshape several near critical masses into a supercritical mass. This can be achieved by physically reshaping them and inducing the phase change to increase the density (thus lowering the mass requirements as shown above). A common design uses Pu in it's less dense delta phase and then induces the alpha phase. Of course such devices require even more fission mass than normal implosion devices, but are smaller devices overall because they aren't required to use large amounts of explosives to generate high compression.
04-11-07, 10:30 AM
#12
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Originally Posted by wmansir
Critical mass is inversely proportional to the square of the density, which increases with pressure. Critical mass for Pu-238 is about a 10kg sphere. The article states that the probe contained about 20kg in 144 individually sealed capsules. So we have about 0.14kg per capsule.
sqrt(10/0.14) = 8.5
So if we increase the density 8.5 times we'll get a critical mass. Of course to get a supercritical mass needed for a nuclear explosion requires at least double that. so we have to increase the density a mere 17 times. That's a slight problem since even modern nuclear devices using shaped charges creating megabars of pressure and shaped cores specifically designed to aid compression only increase Pu density up to around 5 times. 4kg is considered the minmium needed for a modern nuclear device, and that's highly purified weapons grade Pu-239, you would need a few more kg if using Pu-238.
So what is this "alpha state" nonsense that only requires 30 kilobars of pressure?
First off all the "alpha state" doesn't mean the plutonium is going nuclear, which the article implies. Pu has 6 solid phases depending on pressure and temperature, so it just means the metal is changing it's crystal structure to the most dense alpha phase.
The phase change is only critical when you have a linear implosion device that uses the phase change to create a supercritical mass. Linear devices are carefully designed with explosives to reshape several near critical masses into a supercritical mass. This can be achieved by physically reshaping them and inducing the phase change to increase the density (thus lowering the mass requirements as shown above). A common design uses Pu in it's less dense delta phase and then induces the alpha phase. Of course such devices require even more fission mass than normal implosion devices, but are smaller devices overall because they aren't required to use large amounts of explosives to generate high compression.
sqrt(10/0.14) = 8.5
So if we increase the density 8.5 times we'll get a critical mass. Of course to get a supercritical mass needed for a nuclear explosion requires at least double that. so we have to increase the density a mere 17 times. That's a slight problem since even modern nuclear devices using shaped charges creating megabars of pressure and shaped cores specifically designed to aid compression only increase Pu density up to around 5 times. 4kg is considered the minmium needed for a modern nuclear device, and that's highly purified weapons grade Pu-239, you would need a few more kg if using Pu-238.
So what is this "alpha state" nonsense that only requires 30 kilobars of pressure?
First off all the "alpha state" doesn't mean the plutonium is going nuclear, which the article implies. Pu has 6 solid phases depending on pressure and temperature, so it just means the metal is changing it's crystal structure to the most dense alpha phase.
The phase change is only critical when you have a linear implosion device that uses the phase change to create a supercritical mass. Linear devices are carefully designed with explosives to reshape several near critical masses into a supercritical mass. This can be achieved by physically reshaping them and inducing the phase change to increase the density (thus lowering the mass requirements as shown above). A common design uses Pu in it's less dense delta phase and then induces the alpha phase. Of course such devices require even more fission mass than normal implosion devices, but are smaller devices overall because they aren't required to use large amounts of explosives to generate high compression.
04-11-07, 11:16 AM
#20
DVD Talk Hero
Originally Posted by Mrs. Danger
If so, would the Jovians feel compelled do respond? Or would they even notice?
04-11-07, 11:17 AM
#21
DVD Talk Hero
Originally Posted by wmansir
Critical mass is inversely proportional to the square of the density, which increases with pressure. Critical mass for Pu-238 is about a 10kg sphere. The article states that the probe contained about 20kg in 144 individually sealed capsules. So we have about 0.14kg per capsule.
sqrt(10/0.14) = 8.5
So if we increase the density 8.5 times we'll get a critical mass. Of course to get a supercritical mass needed for a nuclear explosion requires at least double that. so we have to increase the density a mere 17 times. That's a slight problem since even modern nuclear devices using shaped charges creating megabars of pressure and shaped cores specifically designed to aid compression only increase Pu density up to around 5 times. 4kg is considered the minmium needed for a modern nuclear device, and that's highly purified weapons grade Pu-239, you would need a few more kg if using Pu-238.
So what is this "alpha state" nonsense that only requires 30 kilobars of pressure?
First off all the "alpha state" doesn't mean the plutonium is going nuclear, which the article implies. Pu has 6 solid phases depending on pressure and temperature, so it just means the metal is changing it's crystal structure to the most dense alpha phase.
The phase change is only critical when you have a linear implosion device that uses the phase change to create a supercritical mass. Linear devices are carefully designed with explosives to reshape several near critical masses into a supercritical mass. This can be achieved by physically reshaping them and inducing the phase change to increase the density (thus lowering the mass requirements as shown above). A common design uses Pu in it's less dense delta phase and then induces the alpha phase. Of course such devices require even more fission mass than normal implosion devices, but are smaller devices overall because they aren't required to use large amounts of explosives to generate high compression.
sqrt(10/0.14) = 8.5
So if we increase the density 8.5 times we'll get a critical mass. Of course to get a supercritical mass needed for a nuclear explosion requires at least double that. so we have to increase the density a mere 17 times. That's a slight problem since even modern nuclear devices using shaped charges creating megabars of pressure and shaped cores specifically designed to aid compression only increase Pu density up to around 5 times. 4kg is considered the minmium needed for a modern nuclear device, and that's highly purified weapons grade Pu-239, you would need a few more kg if using Pu-238.
So what is this "alpha state" nonsense that only requires 30 kilobars of pressure?
First off all the "alpha state" doesn't mean the plutonium is going nuclear, which the article implies. Pu has 6 solid phases depending on pressure and temperature, so it just means the metal is changing it's crystal structure to the most dense alpha phase.
The phase change is only critical when you have a linear implosion device that uses the phase change to create a supercritical mass. Linear devices are carefully designed with explosives to reshape several near critical masses into a supercritical mass. This can be achieved by physically reshaping them and inducing the phase change to increase the density (thus lowering the mass requirements as shown above). A common design uses Pu in it's less dense delta phase and then induces the alpha phase. Of course such devices require even more fission mass than normal implosion devices, but are smaller devices overall because they aren't required to use large amounts of explosives to generate high compression.
04-11-07, 12:01 PM
#22
DVD Talk Gold Edition
Originally Posted by movielib
If OldDude confirms this I'm on board.
Yeah. Sorry wmansir, but I can't just believe some random post on a message board, regardless of how good it looks mathmatically.
C'mon OldDude - tell us what to think!
04-11-07, 12:30 PM
#24
DVD Talk Legend
Originally Posted by movielib
They nuked Jupiter after staging the moon landing, covering up the Face on Mars and suppressing all the astronaut UFO sightings.
What will they do next?
What will they do next?
04-11-07, 12:36 PM
#25
Admin
Thank you grundle. This thread made my day! 
