Do the rods from God exist?
If so-called “Rods from God”–an informal nickname of untraceable origin–ever do materialize, it won’t be for at least 15 years. Launching heavy tungsten rods into space will require substantially cheaper rocket technology than we have today. But there are numerous other obstacles to making such a system work.
What are God’s rods?
The “rods from God” idea was a bundle of telephone-pole sized (20 feet long, one foot in diameter) tungsten rods, dropped from orbit, reaching a speed of up to ten times the speed of sound. A concept design of Project Thor.
Can God’s rods work?
Traveling at hypersonic speeds of Mach 5 or greater, these so-called “Rods from God” would be so completely devastating, they could totally forgo any explosive payload—be it conventional, or nuclear. Among the reasons the science fiction-esque idea literally never made it off the ground was thanks to cost.
Does the U.S. Air Force have rods from God?
Project Thor: What America’s ‘Rods from God’ Space Based Superweapon Can Do. The U.S. Air Force is reportedly considering the deployment of a highly sophisticated new weapons systems in space, which is currently under development under ‘Project Thor.
Who created the rods of God?
expert Jerry Pournelle
The idea was dreamed up back in the 1950s by science fiction writer and space weapons expert Jerry Pournelle, according to The New York Times. He called the system “Thor” and seemed amused that his concept re-enters the military strategy conversation every few years. “People periodically rediscover it,” he said.
Is Project Thor real?
Project Thor was an idea for a weapons system that launches telephone pole-sized kinetic projectiles made from tungsten from Earth’s orbit to damage targets on the ground. Jerry Pournelle created the concept while working in operations research at Boeing in the 1950s before becoming a science-fiction writer.
What is rod used for?
A rod is a bar or a stick, like the curtain rods in your windows or the steel rods inside the structure of a building that help make it sturdy. A rod can be a staff, like a walking stick, or a metal bar used in construction projects.
Do kinetic energy weapons exist?
In 2013, the U.S. Air Force 846th Test Squadron and civilian researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory successfully test-fired a kinetic energy projectile, a tungsten-rich shell moving at 3,500 feet-per-second — more than three times faster than the speed of sound — on a specialized track at Holloman Air …