Originally published at: Fantasy nuclear-powered "flying hotel" is the Hiroshima of Hindenburgs | Boing Boing
…
4 Likes
Great for disaster movies.
21 Likes
Hindenburg and Hiroshima
You make it sound like it’s guaranteed to explode. 
11 Likes
I cant get my head around nuclear fueled jet engines. The nuclear reaction creates enough heat that it can ignite the compressed air?
What is the heat and how is it transported from the reactor to the engine? I don’t think it is going to be steam… Can it make plasma? Or is the reaction actually making fire? Or is a combustible gas being produced that is then lit???
4 Likes
I’ll just point out that, despite the dramatic footage of the explosion, nearly 2/3 of the passengers and crew of the Hindenburg survived that disaster. (36 deaths) Compare that to the 48 deaths out of 54 people onboard the UK’s R101 Airship disaster in 1930, or the 73 people killed in the USS Akron crash in 1933. (Not to mention the many, many high fatality airplane crashes of that era and since)
Having dramatic footage combined with a memorable live radio description really made all the difference.
25 Likes
Pretty sure it’s nuclear → electric → mechanical. An actual nuclear engine sounds like it would be a extended dirty bomb…
EDIT: Whoa, looks like I stand corrected. Check out @BakaNeko’s comment below.
8 Likes
someone needs to re-cut that to the theme of Loveboat which then segues into that frickin’ song from Titanic
4 Likes
17 Likes
this was posted first to r/megalophobia by its creator, and then it weirdly got traction in other subreddits. I don’t know why people (especially people outside reddit) suddenly started glomming on to this as if it were a real proposal.
10 Likes
That makes sense. But isn’t some type of fuel used in every compression/combustion engine?
2 Likes
This ‘concept’ proposes electrically-driven engines(though, oddly, with internals that look exactly like renderings from ordinary fueled jet engines, rather than ducted fans, no doubt reflecting robust communication between the 3d modelling guys and actual engineers); but back in the good old days, when nuclear energy and asbestos were good for you; direct nuclear thermal was the name of the game.
Not generally regarded as a desperately good idea; but did actually work.
14 Likes
Ah, thanks! Yeah, just goes to show how little technical thought has gone into the presentation.
Wow.
So my next thought is that in reality the plane would need dual cores and generators.
4 Likes
Still a dirty bomb. Yay!
6 Likes
Yeah, how can it be a real proposal; it didn’t mention the “blockchain” once!
19 Likes
The engines apparently run on heat from -small fusion reactors- from the video. They show a bonus rotary dingus with red tooling, whatever. Extra steps to an explosion, not promised in the video, but people will believe it can be done after riding along in the safety demo simulating 10-engine failure and/or reckoning the deuterium and tritium have to be farmed someplace.
Meeting rooms! With explosions! It has to be done bc. I can’t get out of this meeting. Which I will also have to Skype to prove it’s not an orgy.
Engines run on heat; if it comes from a reactor that’s as good as burning fuel, without so much carbon footprint. Yeah I don’t see the onboard spares shop.
7 Likes
Cloudpiercer?
16 Likes
It is snow joke!
2 Likes
Also to add… haven’t we talked about the Beetle on BB before??
7 Likes
I, for one, welcome our nuclear-powered tourist overlords. Their baggy shorts, flip-flops, and loud voices will lift is all!
11 Likes
