Moontanman

No but the fail safes of the 1960's were robust enough to stop it from exploding on impact! Citation please, I have not read of any nukes falling from orbit.

Why hype the danger and wring your hands while a asteroid destroys a large area, the danger of a nuke has to be tempered with the danger of a asteroid strike. The 60 meter 12 megaton Tunguska event is quite telling to me and that was an air burst, imagine the chaos that would result from a actual ground strike by a 12 megaton strike in the Atlantic ocean near the East Coast of NA or in the middle of NYC. The difference between the danger of a nuke being launched into space vs an asteroid strike has to be determined outside any unreasonable fear of a nuclear explosion. A single nuke, even a Czar Bomba, would not destroy the earth or cause any more damage than the Czar Bomba. A 250 meter asteroid would be devastating to a continent sized area if not the entire planet. I guess it comes down to which is worse and history shows the detonation of even huge nuclear weapons is not a threat compared to the 250 meter asteroid. https://www.space.com/asteroid-launcher-earth-impact-simulator This site can show how much damage an asteroid could produce. For a 250 meter iron asteroid I get 1.90 x104 Megatons TNT Again, a nuke's reentry vehicle show this has been done already. This would make the danger non existent or at the very least highly limited. The nuke outside Charlotte NC shows this, nukes hitting the ground doesn't just vaporise and spread plutonium all over the planet. https://netspublic.grc.nasa.gov/main/HQ-0025-HQ-FEIS-Cassini-199506.pdf

Which part exactly, we make nukes in reentry vehicles that survive "falling to the ground" as part of our weapons and the bomb outside Charlotte NC is hardly a secret.

I understand that but the threat was mostly anti nuclear hype, the danger was almost nonexistent due to the fact that such a accident was anticipated and the nuclear material wouldn't been a threat for the same reason the nuke buried outside Charlotte NC is not a threat. A container can be easily designed that would prevent any wide spread contamination upon reentry.

I want to say that why I am asking this question is the idea of writing a story based on as few "magical" technologies as possible. One of my fav writers, Vernor Vinge, wrote a series called "Across Real Time" that is based on only one such technology called a "bobble" the sweep of the story is amazing and I want to stay as close to that ideal as possible in the story I am considering.

Thank you, that gives me room to play! I've figured out a "way" to get the beam and now I see it will have to be short range weapon, maybe a few might minutes. BTW, I am going to propose a antineutron beam that decays into antimatter protons assuming the antineutrons have a similar half life to matter neutrons. Now I just have to propose a "magic" to turn a coherent proton beam into antineutrons on the fly! I think I'll name it a gravitational reverse charge pinch! Thanks again!

??? Neither am I Again, a nuke falling from space wouldn't detonate, but even if it did the approximately 60 meter asteroid that produced the Tunguska event in 1908 was equal to about 12 megatons the biggest nuke in the arsenal of the US is supposed to be less than 3 megatons. So why fear it at all?

I was thinking more of neutrons freely moving around not neutrons bound together, I am thinking of a coherent beam of neutrons or even a cloud of neutrons, do they repel, attract or ignore each other. I am thinking of a weapon for a novel but I'd like to know how neutrons react to each other before I begin to speculate.

Ok, lets up the ante, how big an asteroid would justify using nukes? I agree if there is a viable option to a particular situation I would look for an option other than nukes but how far out would you have to intercept a 250 meter asteroid with various methods to effectively intercept it? From what I understand our current detection methods can give us very little time to decide. Should we just allow it to hit or should we prepare a possible nuclear strike and plan to use other means if we detect it early enough. The most powerful tool we currently have would have to be a nuclear strike, the fastest response we currently have would have to be a nuclear strike, where would you draw the line? As far as I know a 1/4 kilometer asteroid has never stuck the earth in modern times but 507 nukes have. You said a nuke falling, are you assuming a nuke falling would detonate? As far as I know no nuke has ever accidentally fallen the earth and detonated, while several have done this none have detonated accidentally. There is one several megaton nuke still burned deep in the ground outside Charlotte NC to this day.

Really, which is worse, a asteroid strike or a nuke falling to the ground? Falling to the ground would not mean detonation, nukes have many fail safes in place to prevent accidental detonation. Remember 507 have already been detonated and we are here alive and well. Again, compared to an asteroid strike how dangerous is the fallout from a few nukes even assuming all of the radiation would fall on the Earth? Remember we are currently living on a planet where 507 nukes have already been detonated above ground.

Do free neutrons attract, repel, or ignore each other?

My main problem is with people who say nukes are dangerous because of the radioactivity involved, unless you are exploding them in near earth orbit I think that radiation is no problem at all. Much like adding a chunk of rock salt to the ocean will cause it to be significantly saltier. Space is full of radiation, exploding a nuke is not going to be a problem and nuclear energy is the most powerful tool we have. People have an unreasonable fear of nukes not realizing how many actual nuclear explosions have actually taken place on the Earth... 507 actually in the atmosphere or above ground. I doubt several nukes used to steer an asteroid away from the earth pose more danger than the actual impact of a sizable asteroid.

Thank you but this is not what dim and me are discussing.

If you did its quite vague, care to tell me which page one post said this?

Then that is what you should have said.

Why would you expect a ICBM to go any further than its designed to? Its the war head that matters not the vehicle that delivers it.

I'm suggesting your assertion is not accurate and the reasons you appear to be giving have nothing to do with the effectiveness or lack thereof of ICBMs or more reasonably the warheads they contain. Nuclear warheads could indeed be used to deflect an asteroid or at least I see no reason they could not be used effectively. Where or not other methods would be more effective is not the issue in this case.

Seriously? Am ICBM warhead cannot explode in space or are you saying a nuclear warhead can only be launched on an ICBM?

As I said... A bit pedantic don't you think? They way you define truth can be used to deny reality, or even more troubling device to not take e a vaccine because you can't prove absolutely the vaccine is 100% effective. Just because we can't prove something absolutely doesn't mean it's not true and it definitely doesn't mean bs beliefs are valid just because someone believes them. Belief does not equal knowledge and in fact belief often prevents knowledge from being accepted. "Philosophy is the talk on a cereal box, religion is a smile on a dog"

ok, wouldn't the explosion have to be quite close to the earth for that to matter? I mean worrying about radiation from a nuke in space would be a bit like worrying the ocean will be polluted by salt by adding a bucket of water from the dead sea to the ocean?

I guess UFOs are alien spacecraft must be true since so many people believe it?

How are nuclear explosions in space a risk for fallout?

How believable it is has nothing to do with the reality of it.