'Rods from God' Weapon System Gets Another Look

Video Statistics and Information

Video

Captions Word Cloud

Captions

[Music] dropping the atomic bombs that essentially forced Japan to end World War two led to a number of weapons and munitions developments amongst them was research into the use of a kinetic energy projectile or basically finding ways to project a really dense piece of metal at ridiculous speeds this would lead to damage but without the explosive effects similar to the Navy's work with an electromagnetic railgun however earlier iterations didn't focus on generating the velocity rather basic physics would come into play by dropping it from really high in the sky so imagine a 2,000 pound tungsten rob dropped from a thousand miles above the earth unlike a bullet you would actually gain speed as a drop eventually hitting its target with power equivalent to an intercontinental ballistic missile without the mess of a nuclear weapon the u.s. actually used a variation of this tactic in Vietnam these lazy dog bombs were small pieces of non explosive steel fitted with fins they were dropped by the hundreds and reached speeds of up to 500 miles per hour and penetrating up to nine inches of concrete this led to the development of project Thor which called for a bundle of 20 foot long 1 foot thick rods dropped from high enough that they could reach sound barrier breaking speeds and again avoid the followed associated with nuclear weapons which were the only thing capable of delivering equivalent damage so I want these rods from God been released two main reasons first the actual weight of the projectile by the time it hits the target is still being debated just as large pieces of space junk break up and burn as they fall the same could happen to these metal projectiles the other reason cost dropping these hammers from the skies could be up to 10 times more expensive than equivalent weapons in the arsenal however with a commercialization of space taking new steps forward by a SpaceX and others that may not be an issue for long I'm Jeff Frankie and this is I in now you

Info

Channel: IEN Magazine

Views: 331,026

Rating: 4.6151204 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: XGeyYpAxFU4

Channel Id: undefined

Length: 2min 0sec (120 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 10 2017

Reddit Comments