Moon Pie wrote:
] The way I understand it, booster rockets blow up on takeoff
] sometimes, with on the order of 1 in a hundred frequency (how
] many shuttle flights preceeded Challenger?). Plutonium is
] their fuel of choice, tens of kilograms per vehicle.
] Plutonium dust is fatal in very small doses, micrograms. So
] that's conservatively a billion lethal doses per vehicle.
] Atmospheric dynamics have been shown to efficiently distribute
] small particles globally.
] I don't want to catch a lungfull of that stuff when somebody
] forgets to convert their units, or asks "what's that button
] do?".

The risk with using radioactive fuel almost entirely pertains to getting it up into space safely, and making sure it dosen't come crashing down. All of the plans I've seen tossed around for application of nuclear propulsion entail construction of the craft in space, launch from space, etc.

Hence, there are a number of possible approaches you can take to minimise risk. Its not like you are going to be using a nuclear engine to launch a space vehicle from earth, thats kinda dumb for a number of obvious reaons. Its more likely that this vehicle would be constructed in space, its radio active fuel brought up in a container that can withstand the explosion of its launch vehicle, and its nuclear engine wouldn't be activated untill it reached a safe distance from earth. etc, etc, etc..

Don't go nuts over this untill we hear what they are planning to do. There _are_ safe ways to do this. Finding them, and subjecting them to peer review will be (the most fun) part of the process.

RE: BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Nasa to go nuclear