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A comment on Why Bezos’ rocket is unprecedented–and worth taking seriously. Parent comment

Re:Why Bezos’ rocket is unprecedented–and worth taking serio... by stcredzero on Tuesday September 13, 2016 @01:45PM (#12490582)
Pointing your rail gun up is best for getting out of the atmosphere ASAP, but how do you build a gun that goes, say, 20 km high into the air?

It's physically possible for us to build a 100km tall tower with current technology. (Columns formed from many highly pressurized tanks made from boron.) It's not really economically feasible, however.

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Re:Why Bezos’ rocket is unprecedented–and worth taking serio... by throwanem on Tuesday September 13, 2016 @01:50PM (#12490629)
I wonder how well such a tower would withstand the forces involved in also launching projectiles at escape velocity.
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Re:Why Bezos’ rocket is unprecedented–and worth taking serio... by stcredzero on Tuesday September 13, 2016 @02:16PM (#12490868)
As of around the year 2000, I remember a figure of 11 miles as the height limit for a fairly conventionally built skyscraper. If we used lightweight truss construction, I suspect we could build a load bearing tower. If we used aerospace grade materials, we could do even better. (Yes, it would be quite expensive.)
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Re:Why Bezos’ rocket is unprecedented–and worth taking serio... by jaggederest on Tuesday September 13, 2016 @06:26PM (#12492764)
Quite expensive like "a significant portion of the annual gross global product"
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Re:Why Bezos’ rocket is unprecedented–and worth taking serio... by jsprogrammer on Tuesday September 13, 2016 @07:07PM (#12492978)
Most of the load could likely be mitigated by wings and buoyant structures.
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