The insane USAF space battleship that almost got built - Project Orion Battleship

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[@FoundAndExplained]

Download Star Trek Fleet Command on iOS & Android and battle in the Star Trek universe here: pixly.go2cloud.org/SH3UL

[@pyeitme508]

Na

[@WolfeSaber9933]

There's another propulsion system Star Trek's Starfleet uses and that is their impulse engines, which has basically nuclear power VASIMR engines for sunlight travel.

[@CAP198462]

Sort of, for sub-light travel in Star Trek the federation used impulse drives, meaning it pushes something out the back rather than fancy physics. Their impulse drives were basically MPD thrusters fuelled by deuterium fusion catalysed by helium 3. The thing Gene Roddenberry knew about was Robert Bussard and the Bussard ramjet. Something to read up on.

[@WolfeSaber9933]

@@CAP198462 The Bussard ramjets are used to fill the tanks of Federation ships with gases for the matter antimatter reactions for FTL travel. Star Trek's equivalent to gasoline is antimatter with dilithium being a means for power conversation and amplification.

[@CAP198462]

@@WolfeSaber9933 not exactly. The Bussard collectors on the tips of the warp nacelles collect interstellar hydrogen. The Bussard ramjet was a different, and not science fiction thing. The M/ARA reaction is deuterium and anti-deuterium plasma. Dilithium crystals moderate the reaction like control rods in a nuclear reactor. The impulse engines are a different thing entirely.

[@enigma6482]

The Orion Space Battleship idea has a lot more in common with, "The Expanse" series, than it does with Star Trek.

[@Commanderziff]

"The Expanse" doesn't have a game willing to sponsor videos for money.

[@docprune9922]

This is fission explosions and a ridiculous clumsy pusher plate.. Expanse was fusion contained and utilised.. If only..

[@RCAvhstape]

@@Commanderziff Didn't Maneo get sponsored for his crazy antics before meeting his fate at the Ring? I think that was how he was making a living.

[@tawabunny]

i was just screaming that watching this video ughhhhhhhhh i get it ur sponsored by fleet command but fucking come on that's the bare minimum aaghh taking a bucket full of bombs propelled by an impossibly large amount of smaller bombs that would immediately melt everyone on board with radiation and comparing it to the fucking Enterprise is a bit rich and also preaching about this fucking moronic idea like it was some missed opportunity ugh BLEGH

[@CasabaHowitzer]

@@docprune9922 an actual fusion drive produces significantly less thrust than nuclear pulse propulsion. The Expanse's Epstein drive is understandably overpowered.

[@icecraftgaming8661]

USAF: Coke we need your help Coke: WHAT THE HELL

[@bricefleckenstein9666]

That wasn't the Air Force. That was the ORIGINAL designers on the original Orion team.

[@donnguyen3795]

"coke"

[@killman369547]

Fun fact there is an even more insane version of the Orion's propulsion system. It's called the nuclear salt-water rocket engine. It basically harnesses the power of a continuous nuclear detonation to produce hilarious amounts of thrust.

[@ateslabattery115]

I would say that nuclear salt water rockets are more akin to ejecting a stream of nuclear reactor core out of your rocket, not quite detonation. That being said, there are some designs that call for a small fusion reaction to be trapped in what is basically a giant magnetic engine bell, in a similar manner to what you are describing.

[@NikkiTheOtter]

@@ateslabattery115 Liberty Bell rocket. Basically your average childrens bottle-rocket...But cranked up WELL past 11.

[@voltthethunderwing8511]

There is already a design and it called the Caplin thruster, Kurksakat (I think that’s how you spell their name) made a video about it.

[@rolflandale2565]

You only need a more bulk booster for nuclear chem-fuel fuse. In reality, you wouldn't need any massive suspension7:32, nuclear is merely an amp version polarity to original flare burst, the craft is *already massive* in ratio. Like nuclear tugg boats, versus manned electric jet 🎿.

[@steverobbins4274]

Are you talking about NERVA? Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Applications? That was pass a gas through a super critical Nuclear pile and use to to A) cool the pile and B) throw out some serious thrust. Worked best with Hydrogen gas.

[@AubriGryphon]

I learned about the Orion drive from Niven and Pournelle's sci-fi book Footfall, where humanity builds an Orion-type battleship called Michael to strike back against an alien force that holds the orbital high ground. Forget 5" guns, they pulled the 16" main guns off of the USS New Jersey!

[@mattmiller4613]

Grunts Grunts Grunts Grunts Grunts Grunts Grunts Grunts Grunts Grunts Grunts Grunts

[@bryfunkenstein]

Micheal was a beast! There's a rendering of it online. They mounted 2 space shuttles and rebuilt some x-15 for fighter craft

[@mundanestuff]

Came here for this and wasn't disappointed. That book needs a faithful movie adaptation.

[@jamesmurray8558]

That was the known space issue with Dr.Louis Wu.

[@veramae4098]

@@bryfunkenstein There is a passage, fighting the alien battleship isn't going well into a space shuttle rams it in just the right spot. First pilot sets course, co-pilot just glances at him and thinks "He didn't even ask me," which is gratitude for assuming he'd have the courage. I really like the Niven / Pournelle books.

[@lightspeedvictory]

Forgot to mention this earlier but from a pure tonnage/size perspective it’s more of a destroyer than a battleship. The role is also more that of a cruiser

[@randycampbell6307]

Actually it's was aimed at being a space-boomer or mobile missile platform :)

[@davidtherwhanger6795]

Ships classifications do change over time. Early "Battleships" were two or three deck Ships of the Line of Battle (which is where the name Battleship comes from). Pre Dreadnought battleships were more like armored cruisers. Destroyers came out of the need to protect the battle line from fast torpedo boats. Hence the Destroyer's original designation Torpedo Boat Destroyers. Modern Destroyers like the Arleigh Burke class are as big as some cruisers. So as these would have been the first capital ship put in space, battleship would probably have fit more. Later as newer models were produced they may have been re-designated, or just left as battleship.

[@randycampbell6307]

@@davidtherwhanger6795 being it was an Air Force "ship" it of course didn't use a Navy designator anyway and was termed a "Deep Space Deterrent Vehicle" and was planned to be analogous with the SLBM force with lots less 'stealth' and lots more Cold War tension :)

[@davidtherwhanger6795]

@@randycampbell6307 Which changes nothing of what I said.

[@randycampbell6307]

@@davidtherwhanger6795 The Air Force would disagree :) In context they were aiming to cut ALL the other services out of anything to do with space, and along the way ensure that no "terrestrial" lingo got used. Aka these weren't 'ships' for that specific reason :)

[@artvogt8135]

For any who may not be aware, the Orion concept was featured in the novel "Footfall" by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle.

[@f.s.1400]

Its a great but a complicated book

[@That70sGuitarist]

And a great read it is, too, like many of their collaborations. "Lucifer's Hammer" featured a similar Earth-shattering impact, but that one was courtesy of Mother Nature herself, rather than a herd of rampaging interstellar proto-elephants.🤣

[@bricefleckenstein9666]

I prefer the concept as explained in "The Curve of Binding Energy", the biography of Theodore Taylor (who led at least part of the REAL project).

[@stefaneer9120]

My grandfather was a Star Trek fan from 1962 until the 90s, because he was really interested about the technology and the message behind the story of the series.

[@VikingTeddy]

Comparing Orion to Enterprise is the dumbest thing I've heard in a while, and an insult to trekkies.

[@alexxbaudwhyn7572]

Trek first aired Fall 1966, fyi

[@versinussyrin577]

I always liked the orion project with nukes because how stupidly insane it was. Even a mind boggling 8 million ton monster was proposed with a 400 meter pusher plate for interstellar voyages Just crazy, as at orions, the bigger it was, the better it got.

[@chriswhite3692]

Orion could have gotten a ship up to 5% the speed of light. We've had interstellar capability for decades.

[@chriswhite3692]

@tst ccnt Which is ironic because a test ban treaty killed it. Placating the commies prevented us from having full access to the solar system and beyond. Kind fucked up, isn't it?

[@bryfunkenstein]

Hazegrayart has 2 versions of orion videos. He has one that launches using a Satutn 5 and another....ark sized ...and Haunting...

[@spartanonxy]

Quite literally Orion type systems scale upwards better then just about any other realistically buildable engine right now.

[@MikeLinPA]

If the radiation being released behind them didn't kill the crew and make the equipment inoperable, flipping around and using the same nuclear explosion propulsion to slow down would guarantee they were plowing through their own nuclear pollution through the entire deceleration process. How many launches would make our near space inhabitable or intraversible due to high radiation? If we cannot do better than this, we shouldn't do it at all. (IMHO)

[@jdiluigi]

Cold war era concepts were awsome. for every 100 concepts we would get 1 test bed/prototype. And they would mostly be canceled because of cost. In the end we were left with stealth and the internet😁

[@unvaxxeddoomerlife6788]

And insanely powerful rockets

[@IshijimaKairo]

I hear Casaba Howitzer, I get really excited. Simple as that.

[@robertdragoff6909]

Sounds like it shoots melons! LOL!

[@bmobert]

IMHO, Casaba Howitzer rounds are the answer to the question of how to diver an asteroid.

[@NikkiTheOtter]

The answer to Fight or Flight. Improves fuel efficiency AND it's effectively a nuclear pulse cannon.

[@CasabaHowitzer]

It's a little sad that there is barely any info about it.

[@former_sub_sailor3368]

​@@CasabaHowitzerbecause it's still classified. A Casaba Howitzer would be able to deliver a spear of nuclear-driven plasma over hundreds or even thousands of kilometers.

[@fridaycaliforniaa236]

I love the madness of the cold war projects 🥰

[@Big_Black_Dick]

😂 lol yeah

[@fridaycaliforniaa236]

@@Big_Black_Dick This was an era when no one cared even a little bit. All was a call for a nuclear design : cars, planes, space crafts, even some tooth pastes lol

[@Big_Black_Dick]

@@fridaycaliforniaa236 lol nuclear powered toothbrushes and radioactive toothpaste 😂 out of control bro lol of course this was before the dangers of radiation really sank in

[@alwynwatson6119]

Did you know the USA actually built some but the New World Order destroyed all of them when America attempted to shell Ukraine from space in order to assist the Russians.

[@alwynwatson6119]

@tst ccnt But it was not designed to fight russia. In fact quite the opposite.

[@captainyossarian388]

It's scary, but as long as it was built in space or delivered to space via rocket booster, the radioactive particles from the explosions would disperse relatively quickly thanks to gravity/solarwind/etc.

[@RegularEarthlingEngineer]

Hopefully the 21st century holds just as insane of projects as the 20th century dreamed to do.

[@almabora405]

hey FBI, dont u know something we dont

[@SilverBazooka10]

The 20th century gave us cocaine soda, radioisotope science kits for kids, and jello salads. I don't think anything can top that.

[@almabora405]

@@SilverBazooka10 kids casually paying with enriched uranium

[@seantaggart7382]

Perhaps We already have stuff like THE AURORA i can't say much I know you probably will kill me But to the person behind the screen The aurora is the sr91 Its said to skip across the sky at mach 5

[@MaticTheProto]

Honestly? I'd much prefer the knd of jump like in Ixion

[@mgr_video_productions]

Still waiting for a real-life Space Battleship Yamato to come to be in 2199.

[@ReddwarfIV]

Casaba Howitzers use the nuclear shaped charge aimed at a blast plate to create a particle beam. I assumed that was why you mentioned them, since it's similar to phasers, but then you confused them with bomb-pumped X-ray lasers for some reason.

[@bryfunkenstein]

I think micheal had both....

[@ReddwarfIV]

@@bryfunkenstein Possibly, though the X-ray lasers just used the drive system rather than missiles.

[@markgavino7769]

This spacecraft reminds me of the Realistic Space Warships made by artists on Twitter. Just that the propulsion needs booms.

[@ralphchristianjerao261]

whats their names? Id like to follow them on Twitter

[@markgavino7769]

@@ralphchristianjerao261 Here's some: Theo Bouvier and L5Resident. But there are others.

[@wretchedexcess1654]

Silent but deadly booms...

[@Jayjay-qe6um]

This is a perfect ship for the Space Force.

[@chaoticwj1772]

Yes.

[@robertdragoff6909]

Absolutely! Name it the USS Trump!

[@hyperx72]

@@robertdragoff6909 Aaand you ruined it

[@Mr820121]

Goggle Solar Warden 😎

[@StandingUpForBetter]

@@hyperx72 Not really.

[@Intrepid17011]

I mean, the original NX01 only had 85 Personel while being much bigger. So, 120 is a good Number, still, must be quite cramped in there.

[@captain_commenter8796]

Aliens: we come in peace Humans: We don’t **Proceed to nuke the planet out of the solar system**

[@weldonwin]

"For the Emperor..."

[@Shenesy1]

Xenos Filth

[@weldonwin]

@@Shenesy1 Death to the alien, the mutant and the heretic...

[@raejannmelchor2947]

Terran Empire

[@charlesneilio7861]

Get ready to be annihilated

[@Yoel_Mizrachi]

The Casaba-Howitzer nukes were not intended to produce X-ray beams but a focused beam of plasma. You are confusing the Casaba with project Excalibur

[@alexxbaudwhyn7572]

Was aware of the Orion nuke pusher plate ship for a long time, many other vids here for Orion, including test footage using conventional explosives to launch a small test ship. New to me is the battleship, weapons payloads stuff

[@Techno_Bunny433]

The idea of riding a nuclear shockwave as propulsion is batshit insane and i love it. The theust based gravity is actually used in the Expanse series, the whole ship would be right at home in the expanse actually, rather than star trek

[@madsteve9]

Freeman Dyson really was incredible.

[@Kakarot64.]

It's like surfing except instead of having Jaws behind you you've got a bomb.

[@garycorbin2789]

Star Trek TNG explored the theory in a episode where a soliton wave was used in a similar manner

[@jdiluigi]

3% speed of light is almost 9000km per second...Not to shabby.

[@russellharrell2747]

Still takes over a century to get to Proxima Centauri. As a generational ship it could work though.

[@Khether0001]

I love your models and animations! They are often some of the best renditions of the crafts that you can ever find! This one in particular is the coolest Orion I've ever seen!

[@vircervoteksisto5038]

Beside the fact that Space Battleship Orion would have unnecessarily escalated tensions with the USSR, launching it from ground level to orbit was known at the time to contribute to strontium-90 emissions which would have contributed to untold levels of cancer around the world. So maybe it's a good thing that this project never got off the ground, literally.

[@kentoncompton3009]

Ideally it would have launched from a conventional rocket, though much bigger. (Think the Saturn Vs big brother, the Nova kzbin.info/www/bejne/qHjbZ2SKnKmpec0 , or everyone's favorite sea launched super rocket, the Sea Dragon kzbin.info/www/bejne/nnmqZI1mhJ6LsNE ) Besides, the sheer tonnage of that craft would be simply impossible to lift even an inch let alone accelerate to mach 20+ to get into low earth orbit using those nukes. Either that or it would be constructed in orbit piece by piece.

[@alwynwatson6119]

But the russians and the americans teamed up to build and launch them. The 20 Orion class battleship was launched after 2010 to combat the New world order.

[@ruskiwaffle1991]

My idea of how it could be built is in orbital drydocks. Launched in pieces with something like Sea Dragon or Star Raker then assembled in space.

[@dorsk84]

You strait up have an XL-5, a WH40k, and the "it never was" meme references in under a minute... was not expecting that.

[@lightspeedvictory]

Requesting videos on the following: -switchblade aircraft designs such as the FA-37 Talon from the ‘05 movie “Stealth” or the X-02 Wyvern from the Ace Combat franchise -Super Tomcat-21 and ASF-14 -the NATF program as a whole -early ATF proposals -Sea Apache -F-20 Tigershark -Bae SABA -Lockheed Martin’s Advanced Technology Bomber proposal

[@edhikurniawan]

So this is the Orion propulsion depicted at the game Terra Invicta. The 1st drive that i feel capable to challenge the Aliens.

[@duitk]

It is, and it is the first drive that allows you to fly around the solar system and fight the aliens on an even footing. Problem is it's sooo expensive in fissiles you can't build many of them. The fuel is just so expensive. Remember they use thousands of nuclear warheads.

[@bricefleckenstein9666]

It IS where Terra Invicta got the idea. Then again, most of their drive designs are based on real life theory designs and research.

[@bricefleckenstein9666]

@@duitk One reason to corner most of the good radioactive sites early in your base building efforts. Then you DO have enough to build and power some Orion-tech ships.

[@aidanacebo9529]

this is absolutely fascinating. imagine what the present would have been like if this had been greenlit.

[@Joshua_N-A]

A neverending arms race, bloated military industrial complex though it'll provide more jobs. You can make an entire nation bend the knee with this thing by just hovering above it. You may not be agree with me but this is what I'd imagine.

[@chiefbigtoe7260]

Reminds me of the the Dropships from Battletech universe.

[@morallyambiguousnet]

The Orion concept was used in the novel "Footfall" by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. I wish that someone would make a movie based on it.

[@f.s.1400]

Its a great but an overloaded book

[@jorenbaplu5100]

This absolutely belongs in the fallout franchise

[@chessoc7799]

Never heard of the battleship version but Orion is still the fastest spacecraft ever designed. At least as far as I know It was meant for really long distances like the gas giants. I think the design never really got abandoned the main problem today is where do you get all those small nukes from ? :)

[@carltonbakerii8274]

Not only that but using nukes like that would irradiate the pusher plate and more than likely the ship itself.

[@bricefleckenstein9666]

Fastest designed using REAL technology. And the nukes involved were not designed to be bombs as such - though they were designed by the SAME man that designed the "even smaller yield" Davy Crockett design.

[@MrMannyfresh78]

It’s crazy to think where we’d be if the space race was just a friendly competition among super powers…

[@chaoticwj1772]

Sponsor or not… This fit The Expanse way more than Star Trek

[@dirkstarbuck6126]

I know your sponsor is Star Trek. But this is more like a Battlestar.

[@wilomica]

Some of the things they considered like Orion were insane. I was astonished when I read about this and other ideas! Good video! the casaba howitzer was also something I read about. I think the s.f. novel was Footfall? In it we got attacked by aliens and so nasa built all the crazy stuff on it's drawing boards hoping one would work well enough to end the alien threat.

[@simonabunker]

Nuclear propulsion is back in development at the moment, but nothing quite as crazy as Orion. I'm sure nothing would go wrong sending a ship with that many nukes on it through the atmosphere, and all the countries under the flight path would be totally fine with it!

[@assemblyrequired7342]

Nobody in their right mind would launch one of these things from the surface, outside of a miraculous breakthrough that prevents the creation or emission of radiation. These would be built in orbit, and would require orbiters to embark and disembark. Any landing capabilities would likely be designed for in case of an emergency, and probably wouldn't be designed to ever take off after a (crash) landing.

[@NikkiTheOtter]

@@assemblyrequired7342 Yep. This was mentioned in the novel Footfall. The area the 'Michael' was launched from was going to be uninhabitable for thousands of years...but if they didn't do it...the whole EARTH would be uninhabitable for millions.

[@assemblyrequired7342]

@@NikkiTheOtter High marks for reference to a novel. Even if, or especially since I've never heard of it. On another level, I think that it's a shame that thus far, early space travel in the Star Trek universe has never been depicted, and ENT missed a golden opportunity. I could have easily pictured the first century of interplanetary or interstellar travel as being similar to that depicted in The Expanse, with comparatively primitive NERVA-style nuclear drives, with only Warp Drive allowing humanity interplanetary travel (at least within the crew's lifetimes). Orion drives by then would be too primitive to bother with. The sublight drives used by the NCC-1701 would use space curvature, allowing greater maneuverability, acceleration, and speeds, as well as the ability to appear as though they are flying.

[@Commanderziff]

You wouldn't have much fun flying this to Alpha Centauri, but you could take a nice voyage around the solar system. Exploring our own backyard is going to be the next great era of exploration. Maybe a few hundred years from now we'll be sending people to other stars.

[@quisqueyanguy120]

Still 3% of the speed of light with technology available since the 1960s is not too bad. It could mean that a generational ship to the Alpha/Beta/Proxima Centauri system might be possible in a century. With antimatter is even better 50 to 80% the speed of light.

[@CasabaHowitzer]

​@@quisqueyanguy120 3% c is pretty terrible for interstellar travel. Anything more than 2.4 ly away would take more than 80 years. Generational ships have certain moral issues attached to them (Who would go on a voyage he will never return from? Can you force a person to grow up and spend most of their life on a space ship?) and there are medical considerations as well (Without gravity, will humans develop normally?). A true breakthrough would be constant acceleration space travel (with meaningful accelerations like 1 g), which would solve all the issues listed above. A spaceship constantly accelerating half the way to Proxima Centauri and decelerating the other half at 1 g would accelerate to almost 0.95 c and reach its destination in slightly less than 6 years from Earth's perspective and only about 3.5 years form the ship's perspective!

[@seanbigay1042]

One day I'd really like to see a good CGI video that shows the Orion in flight, nukes going off and all.

[@Zerzayar]

Imagine what we could have accomplished, what we could have reached with that nuclear pulse engines!

[@marcoplayz7911]

good video, but one question: why is this not on the Escape Velocity channel?

[@FoundAndExplained]

Going to post a much longer one on the whole program soon

[@majordakka5743]

@@FoundAndExplained looking forward to it

[@thaddeuswilson654]

This would have been the essence of will to win. What a crazy concept, so interesting.

[@jimrohrich2625]

A great starship concept. The U.S. should build them.

[@cornpowa]

I don't know if it's still on Netflix, but there was a miniseries, I think it was called "Ascension," that is basically a murder mystery on the Orion spacecraft. I don't want to give away spoilers, so I'll leave it at that.

[@Bkings7]

It was originally on syfi I wish it would have gotten picked up I thought it had potential

[@Chris-ok4zo]

I didn't know Warhammer 40k was based on real tech.

[@skepticalmagos_101]

Riding a nuclear blast wave? ... sounds more like Ork tech. 😅

[@alwynwatson6119]

A lot of what existing Warhammer 40 K is just a weaker version of many of the things that the new world order invented in real life. Take for example the bolter The New World Order rail bolter Is A extra thick rail gun that fires hypersonic Ramjet guided missiles.

[@stefanschleps8758]

Gene Roddenberry was, allegedly, vetted and it was decided he could be trusted with knowledge of ET. Supposedly the basis for StarTrek's "prime directive" was the rule some ET confederations had concerning sentient beings who were less technologically advanced. The whole idea of the TV program was MJ12 approved. It was intended to desensitize humanity over coming decades to prepare us for inevitable ET/Human contact, allegedly. Great animation, thanks for sharing.

[@jeffjr84]

That's called a "super weapon"... Orion had a few scary things... this part i didn't know about..

[@Allan_aka_RocKITEman]

*PROJECT ORION* _still_ -- to my knowledge -- represents the _only_ SSTO {Single Stage To Orbit} spacecraft design that has both HIGH THRUST and HIGH SPECIFIC IMPULSE that could be built with existing technology.

[@ApolloCDR]

What about the NOVA design concept?

[@Allan_aka_RocKITEman]

@@ApolloCDR >>> You mean the follow-on to the SATURN V? No, it was still _staged,_ and had nowhere near the _specific impulse_ of ORION.

[@bricefleckenstein9666]

@@ApolloCDR Nova was a conventional rocket - just a bigger one than Saturn V.

[@TheOneTrueDragonKing]

You asked if Roddenberry had an inside line on the US Air Force. Answer: He WAS Air Force, the 13th United States Army Air Force out of Great Britain to be precise. He served in the United States Army Air Corps, over Europe, during World War II.

[@exposingproxystalkingorgan4164]

They real should have built this space warship and then build more of them. This style of ship is more The Expanse than Star Trek.

[@ranulliyanage252]

This ship is way more comparable to the space ships in The Expanse rather than the Star Trek.

[@littlefishy6316]

Enjoyed watching, high quality presentation, fun and entertaining

[@Shinzon23]

Oh yeah this thing that when shown to Kennedy absolutely horrified him and everyone else in the room who wasn't military and instantly got the Orion program shut down!

[@Shinzon23]

@@alwynwatson6119 I think you might need your eyes checked because if the United States was Building Orion drive starships, the nuclear flashes in orbit would be a dead bloody give away that it's up there.

[@bricefleckenstein9666]

@@alwynwatson6119 We built conventional-explosive powered test devices, never a real Orion.

[@seanbigay1042]

BTW, before I forget, ever hear about Medusa? In this idea the ship is towed by a giant parachute. You toss a nuke out ahead of the ship. The nuke goes off, the chute catches the blast and goes zooming to the Moon and parts beyond, towing the ship behind it. It's essentially a low-rent Orion.

[@Shipwright1918]

Telling that a lot of Project Orion is still highly classified, namely how to build small, powerful, relatively cheap nukes.

[@AlejandroFlores-vi8tl]

God I love the American military, "what should we do about the rise of the USSR in space?" "idfk just put some guns on a big ass fucking rocket"

[@superakman14]

This is more similar to the Expance's ships than startrek

[@ethanpflederer3395]

This thing reminds me of ships in The Expanse.

[@logangrimnar3800]

I did projects and wrote essays on project Orion but I never managed to uncover all the military style variants like this.

[@GreenBlueWalkthrough]

13:06 I think it's more great minds think alike which great video! As for the ship it's a good concept but even with the current space industry and culture it would be easier just to have the ship as a freighter/carrier and leave the gun on satellites and space planes that the USS Orion could deploy when needed or leave behind at port when not.

[@marktercsak9728]

Project Orion, should be built for deep space as originally as envisioned, test models were built one using conventional explosives and it works.

[@jhmcd2]

This was actually brought back in in the 70's as a part of NASA's attempt to see were to go after the Saturn V project was a success. A now weaponless version of the craft (minus what it needed to get around) was proposed, but it too was canceled, this time because...well, funding, but also because they weren't sure how to get the craft into orbit. There were even test with it, and they determined the amount of radiation to get even one of these into orbit using nuclear weapons would be devastating. Not to mention it would still be hyper expensive even once you got past that.

[@StandingUpForBetter]

This is awesome! We need to make this happen.

[@scottrobb651]

Only if it is built in high orbit. It was originally conceived to be launched from the ground. Stuff of nightmares

[@StandingUpForBetter]

@@scottrobb651 Agreed. This is approaching star ship tech. Even in Star Trek, their star ships could ignite and destroy an atmosphere of a planet if flown within the atmosphere. It just seams like a necessary byproduct of creating a space craft that is able to harness the powers needed to travel fast enough for interstellar travel. Having ship yards in space all of a sudden does not sound like such a bad idea. Again a win for Roddenberry.

[@Joshua_N-A]

Militarization of space?

[@Deebz270]

The excellent Sci-Fi novel - 'Footfall' - Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle - features this very Project Orion vessel in its plot... Here is the excerpt from the wikipedia page on the novel. // The US secretly builds a large, heavily armed spacecraft in Washington state that is propelled by nuclear bombs, a real concept known as Project Orion. The ship is named after the Biblical archangel Michael, who cast Lucifer out of Heaven. When there is a security leak, Michael launches prematurely and battles through small enemy "digit" ships, aided by one-man gunships and larger space shuttles carried aboard Michael and released as needed. Though seriously damaged, she pursues the alien mothership. One of the shuttles rams the Fithp ship, damaging it badly enough that it cannot escape Michael.... ...An act of sabotage by the humans aboard the alien vessel disables the Fithp engines, allowing Michael to inflict heavy damage, which forces the Fithp to accept humanity as the stronger species and surrender themselves to become part of the human "herd". In the final scene, the Fithp leader lies on his back and allows the former captive Dawson to place his foot on his chest, which is the formal Fithp gesture of surrender. // en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Footfall

[@bricefleckenstein9666]

And some of the concept for Footfall came from Poul Anderson's novel "Orion Must Rise", which ALSO had a group build an Orion craft in the Pacific Northwest (but had better success on the secrecy). But the CORE of the concept was the REAL Orion Project, reference Theodore Taylor's biography "The Curve of Binding Energy" and the life of Freeman Dyson (by Dyson's standards, Orion was a SMALL concept - reference "Dyson Sphere" and it's cut-down variant the Ringworld).

[@Ash-jk7gi]

I absolutely love your videos. So informative and so well laid out. I always smile when I get a new video notification!

[@WolfeSaber9933]

For the missiles, in space those plumes won't exist. You'll just see the light from the engine.

[@nickymouse1617]

orbital mechanics left the chat

[@PsycoDwarf9]

I studied this. 1950's tech, if the math holds up, it's a great way to tool around the solar sstem.

[@hetzer5926]

This takes “the answer is always bombs” to a new level. Never change Air Force. Never change.

[@spiderjake1000]

Imagine how far we could have gone with this. Literally.

[@Mr_Lukasgrim]

I would like if you would make video about Avrocar flying saucer!

[@user-ii8iz5df7z]

and now they are creating Orion spaceship for Gateway...

[@richardlangdon712]

The original Orion project envisioned a spacecraft the size of a large ocean liner. The reason was that the increased mass would make the acceleration much easier on the crew than if it was a smaller and lighter ship. A ship that large could store all the nuclear devices needed for exploring the solar system and returning in only a matter of months. The slogan of the people working on the project was "Saturn by 76!".

[@quisqueyanguy120]

3% of the speed of light with technology available since the 1960s is quite impressive. It could mean that a generational ship to the Alpha/Beta/Proxima Centauri system might be possible in a century. With antimatter is even better 50 to 80% the speed of light.

[@GlamorousTitanic21]

This is one of the reasons why the Cold War is one of my favorite periods.

[@adrianaa3059]

I know that things like that are just bound to randomly happen, but if you translate Casaba Howitzer to Portuguese, it comes as (basically) " *dick slinger* " (estilingue de mandiocas) or "dick basket" (cesto de mandiocas)... Looks like George Lucas might have named it, Panaka literally translates as "Dweeb", Queen Amidala as *Queen Tonsil* , and Count Doku, _literally_ as " *Count fuU-Uck-my-as-whole* "(I swear!) (sorry for misspelling it but yt wouldn't let me write it normally)

[@DWPL89]

"with up 300 000 warheads being used" - I think the estimated price for gas also scared president away. I know those ones would be significantly smaller than city killers of the day but still... nuke is nuke.

[@simonwaldock9689]

From what I've heard a way was found to make nukes really cheaply. This is one part of the project that is still highly classified.

[@CaptRR]

City Killer? No this thing would be planet killer, a mobile extinction level event. Here's the thing no one ever talks about, any drive system that is capable of propelling any significant mass up to interplanetary speeds is a doomsday weapon just by crashing said drive into a planet. Seriously, slamming a 4000 ton spacecraft into a planet at any fraction of cee would pretty much ruin everyone's day.

[@mattmiller4613]

Likey the kind of thing he stood in the way of that got him sadly offed.

[@j-twd930]

@@CaptRR Yeah. Any spacecraft capable of moving at decent speeds would require, at *minimum* fission or better. So current nuclear at the low end. Essentially: fission->fusion->antimatter. Honestly such a shame that this was never completed. Because regardless, in future when humans want actual fast travel times, we would need nuke-power levels anyway.

[@may86bear]

It wouldn’t surprise me if such a ship already exists( spaceforce)🤔🖖

[@GenUineUFOs6833]

May86bear It does.

[@ralphsexton8531]

Roddenberry and staff did consult with NASA and other agencies, and the episode "Tomorrow is Yesterday" referenced a "first manned mission to Saturn" suggesting they did indeed have some idea of what NASA was thinking about...

[@baraxor]

Orion was developed first in parallel with, and later supplanted, schemes like the Project Horizon and Lunar-X meant to eventually provide a nuclear launch platform that seemed invulnerable to a bolt-from-the-blue Soviet attack that could decimate or even eliminate American nuclear retaliation...if a reserve of nuclear-armed missiles could be based in space or on the Moon, it was reasoned that this would be sufficient to deter a Soviet Pearl Harbor scenario, as a counterstrike could be launched long before any possible attacker could reach them. The idea of nuclear missile bases on the Moon fell by the wayside when it was realized that there was nothing to stop the Soviets from establishing their own missile bases on the Moon specifically targeting the American ones. However, the idea of a "space battleship" performing a SSBN-like patrol in deep space, with missions lasting a year or more, did gain some currency, as it was felt that, although they could be seen and tracked, such ships would still be able to credibly deter a surprise attack on Earth as it seemed unlikely that the Soviets could develop craft/systems that could damage or destroy the "space battleship" before it could launch its complement of weapons.

[@chrisbreneman6605]

I wouldn't be at all surprised to one day find out that we built six of these and never told anyone.

[@ExiledPiasa]

Would love to see a SW or BSG version of this. Very cool.

[@EZ-D-FIANT]

You talked about warp drive while showing pics of the spore drive..... Damn I wish they built this that propulsion system is pure mental.....

[@funkadunk666]

Dudes really invented the external combustion engine

[@D.M.S.]

And every piece of dust in space would obliterate the ship without some sort of deflector

[@Subhumantrash69]

Micro asteroids and micro black holes are too small to prepare for in advance, assuming this propulsion system even works as intended. My uneducated guess is that EMP will fry any unprotected electronics.

[@D.M.S.]

@@Subhumantrash69 You can protect against the EMP, but not almost everything. One rocket and this thing is a goner. They need some sort of armor in the front and the sites against enemy fire and space itself.

[@Subhumantrash69]

@@D.M.S. Yeah at the speed this type of propulsion system promises every speck of space dust would be like a bullets

[@LarryPhischman]

Kennedy canceled the militarized version, not the exploration version. The USAF had already lost interest in the exploration and heavy lift versions. The generals didn't see enough uses for an ultra-heavy lift vehicle that could put a WW2 era battleship in orbit. Small minded fools.

[@warblerblue]

"The insane USAF space battleship that almost got built…" Jean Luc Picard- " Make it so. "

[@UNAL0504]

We all need this ship to go forward can you imagine if that money was spent on the ship instead of weapons what humanity can achieve

[@grdja83]

I understand this was done under mobile game sponsorship but you talked way too much about Star Trek and too little about project Orion.

[@bmobert]

IMHO, Battleship Orion should become the first generation of Earth Guard ships to protect Earth from impacts. A fleet if Nuclear Pulse powered spacecraft with Casaba Howitzer rounds as projectiles could rendezvous with even an interstellar asteroid and deflect it before coming back come. Yes! I mean an Orion style craft with 20-50 km per second of delta-v. It waits at Earth-Luna Legrange point 2 for emergencies and has enough dV to rendezvous with an interstellar asteroid, diflect it, study it and then come home to Luna. Any asteroid from within the solar system would just be that much easier. It can be done. We can do it. And we should do it. And there are plenty of reasons why.

[@Gwestytears]

1:42 fireball xl5 in the background

[@catguy9229]

The only problem is how do you get an entire battleships worth of material to space?

[@simonwaldock9689]

Build it on Earth and launch it into space in one piece. Of course, using nuclear bombs to launch it makes the launch site a trifle... warm. In the radioactive sense, not just the thermal. During the Cold War, a small price to pay.

[@mattmiller4613]

One frkn piece "sat launch" at a time.😉

[@slimetank394]

This is why we need a moon base first before any space exploration operation.

[@Thethyck4445]

@@simonwaldock9689 I'm pretty sure we need the entire arsenal of US nuclear armaments and then some to get that thing into orbital velocity I'm sure the fall out from that would be great 😂

[@pantheraerospace752]

@@Thethyck4445 we would need all the nukes in the world to propel a ship like that

[@AaronShenghao]

Can politicians just give space a break… you have nothing but space in Space! No need to fight over space in space… (Does that means U.S. Space force should also govern airspace, ocean space and land space?

[@gabevee3]

This Orion propulsion idea was used in the film Deep Impact

[@niehlsbohr]

Coca-cola + Project Orion = Nukacola!

[@twinslife1563ferev]

Fun fact: gene Roddenberry was actually a young pilot in the USAF

[@NSPlayer]

Never show star trek discovery in your show ever again

[@FoundAndExplained]

they sponsored the video! If you would like me to do an add-free video then we have KZbin members, patreon and donations available to help fund development :)

[@Spiritofaconure]

Who ever would be a test pilot for this… you are the man!!!!