A Space Cannon That Might Actually Work

Unequivocal writes "Chalk another one up to Jules Verne. Physicist John Hunter is proposing a space cannon with a new design idea: it's mostly submerged. 'Many engineers have toyed with the [space cannon] concept, but nobody has came up with an actual project that may work. Hunter's idea is simple: Build a cannon near the equator, submerged in the ocean, hooked to a floating rig ... A system like this will cut launch costs from $5,000 per pound to only $250 per pound. It won't launch people into space because of the excessive acceleration, but those guys at the ISS can use it to order pizza and real ice cream.' Though it won't work on people, with launch costs that low, who cares?"

Comments

Re:We need more ideas such as this

[ColdWetDog]

Engineering challenges can be solved easily.

Perchance, are you in management? Or Sales?

Re:We need more ideas such as this

[Entropy98]

design the cannon like a thermos bottle as sounds require a medium to propagate which is why in space no one can hear you scream.

So your going to have explosive pressure on one side, huge water pressure on the other side, and a vacuum in the middle?

Re:We need more ideas such as this

[pnewhook]

actually i would say a space elevator is a funding problem.

Speaking as an aerospace engineer, I would say building a space elevator is a reality problem