MicroFactzzz#0097 · 🏛️ History Gone Off the Rails
The US Built a Flying Nuclear Reactor Meant to Fly Forever
In the 1960s, Project Pluto tested a supersonic cruise missile powered by a nuclear reactor, capable of circling the globe for weeks.
During the Cold War, the US military developed a program codenamed Pluto — a cruise missile powered directly by heat from a nuclear reactor instead of chemical fuel.
The concept called for such a missile to fly at supersonic speed at very low altitude for weeks, theoretically circling the Earth multiple times before reaching its target.
The problem was that the mere flyover of such a machine would be lethal — the unshielded reactor emitted ionizing radiation and left behind a contaminated exhaust trail, regardless of whether the missile carried a warhead.
The program was successfully tested on the ground, but shut down in 1964 — the idea of a "flying Chernobyl" passing over allies and enemies alike was deemed politically and morally unacceptable.
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Krulicza Nora
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