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A comment on Relativistic Spaceship. Parent comment

Re:Relativistic Spaceship by ithkuil on Monday February 05, 2024 @07:09PM (#39269003)
What if the front one is only a small fraction of the thrust at the rear? Would that be enough to "clear the path". Surely it would cost some efficiency but it may beat he alternative
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Re:Relativistic Spaceship by timschmidt on Monday February 05, 2024 @10:14PM (#39270346)
Whipple shields [1] don't weigh much, and don't involve negative acceleration of any kind.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whipple_shield

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Re:Relativistic Spaceship by the_third_wave on Tuesday February 06, 2024 @08:43AM (#39274077)
In other words the space-equivalent of a supercavitating torpedo like the Shkval [1], more or less an underwater rocket which creates its own gas bubble around the projectile by deflecting part of the exhaust stream to nozzles on the front of the device.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VA-111_Shkval

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