Re:Powering the Lunar Base
by Andrew_nenakhov on Saturday August 07, 2021 @05:57PM
(#28102249)
Because the barge is carefully positioned to be in a place this exact rocket drops from the sky.
Satellites are not 'sitting in orbit', they are falling on earth extremely fast, and not reaching it only because they fall sideways. Since they go very fast, they have immense momentum. To attack a target you have to steer that momentum elsewhere, and that takes a lot of energy and precision,and you also have a very small attack area for every satellite. So to cover all earth reliably you'll need a constellation with numbers like Musk's Starlink - i.e. thousands of satellites.
Re:Powering the Lunar Base
by tsimionescu on Sunday August 08, 2021 @01:05AM
(#28104332)
Do you really not understand the differences in difficulty between a cooperative, planned ahead rocket landing, and an adversarial attack on an actively evading target whose position may not be precisely known even at the start of the attack?
2. As a species we can land a rocket on a barge, do you think we can't land a big crowbar on a slowly moving target?
3. Might make 2 more difficult but a 1-ton tungsten rod is pretty durable.
Certainly more potent against a static target but with modern tech and one skilled, ethically ambivalent engineer, these days you could probably hit a row boat.