A Night at the Opera

Looked at the news this morning and the Amazon is burning, Greenland is melting, and this evening David Koch is dead. Yesterday spacexnews had an article about nuclear power in space. The comments were truly idiotic. Surprised my name was not brought up since I endlessly commented about nuclear energy and space propulsion. They are the most disgusting creeps on the internet by far. And it seems there are some planets that might be habitable not too far away. Better start building those starships if we are going to send any by 39.

I only expect the one comment so I might as well reply to it with an edit:

39 is a Queen fan thing.
Not really happy with that internet article since it absolutely shows how politically biased the space program decision-making process is. I am pushing 60 and have been reading about this technology and been hands-on in the military since I was 20. I have worked on and crewed several types of vehicle and aircraft as a systems troubleshooter and operator/aircrew. And being interested in this technology and history and being a voracious reader has given me what I believe is a unique perspective. My big five personality profile is high on openness so I see this in a different way than those who are more…conservative. My view is all about what works or will work. And this is what I think:
Due to the Parker-Dyson-Spudis Continuum only nuclear pulse is going to enable humans to travel Beyond Earth and Lunar Orbit (BELO). Nuclear Thermal Rockets are a dead end simply because it is hard enough keeping a chemical rocket from melting. Trying to contain a reaction a million times more powerful results in Isp’s only about double that of chemical rockets. Pathetic. No other term for it except maybe incredibly wasteful. Stan Ulam understood the problem and solved it with bombs which provides Isp’s in the tens of thousands. There are of course intelligent people like Dyson and Solem who have followed Ulam but their work is not being considered. Why? Because of the eye-roll factor of using bombs for propulsion. Very simple details like this are trapping humankind on Earth.