Slashdot Mirror
Land Speed Record Broken: 0-6,400 in Six Seconds
linuxwrangler writes "Researchers at Holloman AFB have broken their own two decades old land speed record for rail vehicles. The rocket powered sled covered the 3 mile track in roughly 6 seconds. Preliminary numbers put the sled's speed at mach 8.6 or about 6,400 mph - it covered the last 1.8 miles in just 1.3 seconds. The previous record of 6,122 mph was set on Oct. 5, 1982. Other accounts are at the Alamogordo Daily News, the Denver Post, and CNN."
For the non-US people in the world:
"Researchers at Holloman AFB have broken their own two decades old land speed record for rail vehicles. The rocket powered sled covered the 4.8 km track in roughly 6 seconds. Preliminary numbers put the sled's speed at mach 8.6 or about 10300 km/h - it covered the last 2.9 km in just 1.3 seconds. The previous record of 9851 km/h was set on Oct. 5, 1982. Other accounts are at the Alamogordo Daily News, the Denver Post, and CNN."
Maybe we should make a rule that say you always have to supply metric and imperial units... It would make my job so much easier...
That is an urban legend. This story started it. Or rather, the events portrayed in the story led to the urban legend; the story was written long after the urban legend started flourishing.
This post is free (as in cheese in a mousetrap).
Those who sacrifice security to condemn liberty deserve to repeat history or something. - Benjamin Santayana
To give you a clue how high that is, Dave Purley survived a crash where he pulled 179 G's. He suffered 29 fractures, six dislocations, and six heart stoppages. It was the result of a near-instantaneous stop while hitting a wall at 108MPH (about 160kph, I think). IIRC, the Guinness book puts the time he sustained that g-force at a couple of thousandths of a second.
.10 second area. The max sustained g-force is about 7. If you've ever seen a dragster accelerate up close, you can extrapolate the violence yourself. :D
As another perspective, Top Fuel drivers in the NHRA cover a quarter of a mile in roughly 4.4 seconds, from a standing start, reaching speeds of over 320MPH. The 0-100 times are generally in the
'Standards' in computing only impress those who are impressed by things like 'standards'.
Here's the deal: Regardless of whether the "vehicle" makes contact with the ground via wheels or a rail, it more or less is flying while in contact with the ground. Anyone who remembers "blue lightning" will recall that it was/is a missle painted blue with a driver's seat and wheels. If you want a record for the fastest gasoline-powered car, that's a whole separate arena. These people are trying to get something that 1) goes the fastest while 2) remaining in contact with the ground in some way. The reason this craft could go so fast is precisely because the rail system reduces the friction from the ground to a significant degree.
stuff |
Are there even human beings "driving" it?
I think it's safe to say "no"
if there were humans driving it at the start then there wouldn't have been at the end. apart from the fact that the sled stopped yb hitting an immobile object, the humans would have been but a red paint job at the back of the cabin by then anyways
Not this time, anyway. Although over at the International Space Hall of Fame, only about 15 miles from where the above test occured, is the rocket sled ("Sonic Wind 1") that John Stapp rode in 1954 at the same testing grounds when he earned the title "Fastest Man Alive". Granted that was only 632 mph, but he did sustain a deceleration of around 40 Gs that reportly forced his eyes partially out of their sockets.
The forces on this particular test would have easily killed a human, so it's safe to assume that this one was riderless.
[I'm a former Space Hall tour guide, just sharing some trivia..]
In the Portland, Ore area and like card games? Check out: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/portlandgames/