The problem with antimatter could be summed up in three points: 1. Antimatter is quite difficult to create, it requires huge particle accelerators to achive a reasonable amount of antimatter that could sustain flying. 2. Using antimatter as a source of fuel is inadequate, since every time you create an antimatter you create regular matter as well, so the energy input is just ridiculous compared to alternative sources. 3. How would you be able to store antimatter on a vehicle - that is fundamentally made from regular matter- without annihilating them both, not just that but rather how would you be able to transport it from particle accelerators to the vehicle with annihilating it with the air and the universe as a whole. Due to the previous reasons antimatter isn't a proper solution to hyper-sonic vehicles fuel problem. However i think it may be wise to use such tech in space-related propulsion systems to achieve interstellar travel.
@@saudyassin5352 .. While I agree, and would add faster planes are a luxury we don't need, antimatter can be stored in a strong magnetic field that can also be used to direct antimatter to matter in a controlled manner, heating up a heat engine + generator combination.. Nuclear power makes the most sense, power-to-weight-wise, but obviously we don't want flying dirty bombs that potentially damages stewards who work on the flights everyday.. Would require far less emissions though... Personally I think we need more CO2 in the atmosphere so Kerosene is good enough for me.
I’m a former aeronautical engineer and found this very interesting - thanks SH! Loved the TED talk giggles. Pissed about the wasted billions on hypersonic weapons that could do so much good elsewhere.
Commercial airliners are flying with same speed as 50 years ago aside from brief semi-succesful Concorde. It is much easier to do hypersonic in missiles. Because they are expendable so you can add 1 or 2 booster stages to reach desired speeds to kick in ramjet.
The title "aeronautical engineer" is taken by credulous laymen to mean something decent, but those of us who have studied military history understand it the equivalent of "bullet designer" or "chemical weapon designer."
Hi Sabine What a great talk. I am a retired professor of Aerospace Engineering and I used to teach courses on hypersonic aerodynamics and spacecraft design ( including hypersonic glide vehicles). Thus I have watched with dismay the current hype being generated about hypersonic glide military missiles. Your comments are spot on. One thing no one mentions is the enormous fuel load that sustained hypersonic flight in the atmosphere takes , leaving little left for payload.
It just goes to prove that you're missing something, professor! The Khinjal is real; it's no hype. It has proven itself in the battlefield and they are very hard to detect before it's too late.
@@NedBoukharine They are just "hard to detect" because there has been not the proper investiment (read "cash") applied towards detection: dedicated infrared detection satellites or whatever else science can come up with.
@@Allbbrzwell yes but there are or should be two discussions here: do these weapons provide an edge as of today (discussion 1) and do they provide an edge for the foreseeable future (discussion 2). It seems to me 1 is an obvious yes and 2 an obvious no (after watching this video). But I would caution against the classic scientific complacency that because something can be done because white paper science has proven it doesn’t mean it can be engineered easily or quick or cheap or all of the above. Classic misunderstanding between researchers and real world people with real world problems. Russians hypersonic missiles today are a real threat and break the MAD doctrine, in a nuclear war as of today they would prevail, or so it seems. Happy to hear more arguments. Finally I would have liked to hear SH talk about the MHD which apparently has made these weapons possible
Seriously, was that guy doing the Ted talk supposed to be an expert in the topic? The way he throws in nuclear fuel and anti-matter for hypersonic flights reminds me of scriptwriters who sprinkle in the word "quantum" to make an idea sound sciencey.
@@kalicacao Way to stay on her good side, when you feel like saying something stuff your mouth full of cotton. It'll dry your mouth out but she can you 6" tall for speaking what little mind you have.
Well he didn't really screw up. She just framed it in a way that made it seem like he did - as though he was saying that hypersonic flight would require antimatter, but that's not what he was saying. And she left out the sentence right before that clip from the talk where he said "Now let's look far down the technology road." He then emphasized that he was referring to "some form of safe nuclear energy". He just used antimatter as an example and then acknowledged that "this is far out there but this is technology people are working on". In the comments under the video, he wrote that it "may be 50 or more years away but I anticipate it will happen eventually. There are researchers and start-ups today with good ideas for harnessing antimatter for propulsion applications. It's worth doing some research on the subject." I don't see anything wrong with what he was actually saying.
@@GumbyTheGreen1 Thanks for the update as I got the feeling he was basically saying "we can fuel this using magic and fairy dust". I'm exaggerating, but "dark matter" is still theoretical, at best.
@@johnarnold893 John, this was an analogy! We are no longer cave dwellers who need to see with their own eyes everything to be able to imagine its existence. Have you ever seen an electron? And yet, you (and we all) use them and control them all the time nowadays. Still, that mindset that Sabine shows is comparable to cave dwellers who had not yet mastered fire. If they had had her mindset back then, we would still live in caves today! Anti-matter, atom by atom, exists at CERN, although I never saw it and probably never will.
Thank you Sabine. I'm a former aerospace engineer and am frustrated by the hype and misinformation surrounding this subject. Your expose was fantastic, beautifully dry and very timely. Thank you again for making and posting this.
Thank you Sabine. I really appreciate your pragmatic and honest perspective. Your presentation and production techniques are outstanding. Please keep them coming ♥️
Sabine, as usual, excellent talk. An article pointed out two other aspects of hypersonic missiles: the plasma in front of the missile is easily seen by radar, and the energy needed to change direction (unpredictable movement) is so immense it is not feasible
As an engineer, I'm happy that Sabine covered an engineering topic today. A welcome respite from theoretical physics and physics-bashing. I particularly liked the way Sabine explained the engineering challenges to a non-technical audience. Oh, and she used equations! IMO, you _have_ to use equations if you want to explain a technical topic concisely and precisely. 👍
I am glad you like it. This video was quite a challenge but I learned a lot along the way! Notably, I had no idea that the temperature rises so much so quickly.
@@SabineHossenfelder I'm sure I speak for many fans when I say I was thoroughly satisfied with the bashing-quotient contained herein. That will keep me going all week. :D
Physics-bashing? Clearly you don't know what you're talking about - she is one of the very few physicists doing their damnedest to PROTECT physics from the fantasists.
I dreamed today that a friend skipper asked me why he cannot increase the speed of his boat a lot even with the new larger engine. I looked into his data and answered him that this is too close to the speed of light and he needs to use the relativistic equation. This is what physicists dream about 😬
I once dreamed a monkey crushing me at near speed of light at the event horizon. The monkey was so blue-shifted, it turned into same condition as the moment after big bang where no photon existed. I am not even a physicist.
This video was great! One small thing: The dissociation of molecules is actually an effect that helps the vehicle to reduce the temperature in the stagnation point. Reentry vehicles try to maximize this effect by using blunt edges, so that the shockwaves distance to the vehicle allows the full dissociation, which absorbs some part of the energy. So dissociation is good for hypersonic flight and is a precondition that we need to make reentry work.
11:12 Hyperloop? Please, do tell. You occasionally debunk various technologies, even did so in this video. Hyperloop has been debunked by several prominent youtubers, the fact that you're for it is very intriguing. I would love to see you make a video about the topic, addressing the concerns of these debunkers.
Well, I'm not sure what hyperloops are, but she just mentioned them as an aside in this video, so I wouldn't really take that as a well-researched endorsement of the technology. And she was speaking in relative terms, saying it "makes more sense" not "it makes practical sense", so I wouldn't take it as an endorsement in absolute terms either.
Debunkers have mentioned convincing points such as: - lower capacity over time than trains despite higher speed - potential for quick catastrophe with even one little technical failure (trains can usually switch tracks in time or be re-routed, straight and rare tubes do not offer this flexibility) - immense construction costs - lack of necessity It's a bit like Elon Musks system for transporting tesla cars on singular pods. Unnecessary and less efficient than a train on which you can load your car. Or his weird car tunnel that turned out to be a regular tunnel with some colourful lights in it. Welcome to modern "innovation."
Mainly daft ones like thunderfoot. Even then not so much debunked as repeatedly pointed out the same potential risks, mocked some students test rigs and gasped annoyingly.
Hyperloop offers a theoretical path to high-speed ground-level (or below-ground level) transportation. It is equivalent to re-creating the edge of space in a tunnel. The challenge is converting that theoretical possibility into a practical mode of transportation. Without economic viability, you won't be able to get investors to fund really smart people to develop the technology. Most likely, it will take a country like China, whose government doesn't have to worry about profitability, to create a working hyperloop -- if they develop any interest in it. In that regard, the video is accurate -- the theory of reducing air friction to achieve high speeds may be more promising than creating planes that have to face incredible air friction to travel at high speeds.
@@uhmnope4787 She did mention the idea of excavating the tube rather than constructing the pressure vessel underground. I honestly don't understand why that hasn't been the predominant area of development considering it solves the issue of building infrastructure over land already in use, and (I'm not an engineer so any who are reading this, please correct me if I'm wrong) I'd imagine solid rock coupled with some insulation against moisture and cracks would be much more reliable as a vacuum chamber. I understand the problem of upfront cost but as you said its already prohibitively expensive compared to regular train lines.
The space shuttle especially returns with very large Mach numbers into the atmosphere. It is shaped in a way so that the boom becomes detached, like a bow wave. And exactly the problem you were describing about very large temperatures occuring at stagnation, is actually adressed by its design. The underside is protected by the black coloured tiles - they can sustain the largest temperature. The rest of the shuttle is protected by white coloured tiles, they sustain less temperature. BUT at the wingtips and even the tail, you can find spots with the black tiles. That are the areas where the boom actually hits the space shuttle and therefore needs extra protection to withstand the stagnation temperature.
@@emperorpicard4901 Because, shortly speaking, Madgeburg Spheres and high-school physics. Thunderf00t, Common Sense Sceptic and host of other had done pieces on this and more reputable engineering channels didn't even touch it with 10meter rod.
@@SabineHossenfelder before you hype the euhm hyperloop please consider this: a very long vacuum tunnel, a pod somewhere down that tunnel, an accidental rupture, and you become an uncontrollable projectile...
Hitting pause and studying the slide is golden btw. it's so bonkus, just random stuff in there, then put a random Faymanm diagram, some circle with electron and positron. Its completly bullshit, yet so "inspirational talking", TED at it's worst...
It is quite amazing, that Sabine actually got to such detailed sources about this topic. It is extremely hard to get reliable data in a reasonable time. I imagine that if I would want to gather reliable knowledge on this topic, I would have to spend around a month on full time studying various articles.
Longer. Honestly, her research on this topic is very cursory and superficial. You could match her research in a month, yeah, but you (and her) wouldn't really fully understand it in a month ;) Which isn't a slight against you, or her. There's just a lot _to_ know. Her video is a very "101" level understanding of the subject matter. I'd give her video an A+, but at the end she tries to draw some conclusions, and her research is no where near that. The vid is kind of an oversimplification.
Best and most succinct summary of hyper-sonic missiles I have seen. I hate it when threats are overblown and the media eats up and pushes the false narrative.
Sabine, very illuminating on the pros and cons of the hypersonic vs ballistic missiles. I like your reaction on that guy's push on antimatter power. How can he not know the amount of energy and cost to make and keep a tiny amount of antimatter is beyond reach. I suspect he got the idea from Dan Brown's Angels and Demons.
The idea of hypersonic glide vehicles is that they can maneuver at lower altitudes at hypersonic speeds. Rockets cannot do this. They do produce a lot of infrared but there is a lot of latency between space based infrared satellites and ground based interceptor missiles so its useless for targeting.
@@tomx641 Also it's near impossible for something going that fast to chance direction. ICBMs can't hit a moving target. I read that the top speed of carriers is classified. Plus, even if you could, you would need an extensive and vulnerable "Kill chain." There's a reason the U.S. didn't sign the space treaty and has ramped up Space Force. I mean, if something happened to the Russian and Chinese navigation satellites...what a shame.
"Optimized ballistic" reintroduces the predictability of the flight path. That it might be slightly faster than a standard ballistic missile almost doesn't matter at this point as the ability to intercept even faster targets on predictable flight paths (satellites) has already been demonstrated. In the Burnt Frost test a US Navy cruiser shot down a satellite in orbit. The MIT paper seems to deliberately mislead. Nobody is interested in hypersonics because they're faster than existing ballistic missiles. They're interested in hypersonics because they're faster than existing CRUISE missiles and less predictable than BALLISTIC missiles. The Russian Kinzhal missile is nothing more than an air-launched semi-ballistic missile. It uses solid rocket motors, and can do a bit of maneuvering, but it can't maneuver to the degree a boost-glider or cruise missile can. But it CAN get from point A to point B very quickly and is more difficult to shoot down than a subsonic cruise missile. And, because it's basically an Iskander battlefield missile modified for air-launch, it was something that could be cobbled together relatively quickly. None of this is new stuff. ICBMs were virtually impossible to shoot down without using nuclear warheads on the defensive missiles, and they were a LOT easier to do and cheaper than atmospheric hypersonic weapons, so this made them the weapon of choice for over half a century. The US, with THAAD, SM-3 and GBI demonstrated long range ballistic missiles can reliably be shot down now without resorting to nuclear-armed defensive weapons, thus the scramble by China and Russia to methods other than ballistic missiles. The US is jumping on the bandwagon because eventually Russia and China will be able to shoot down ICBMs as well. Back in 1980 the USAF flew the ASALM cruise missile faster than the X-51 (reaching Mach 5.5). In the 60s the US flew a maneuvering hypersonic boost glider (BGRV) at Mach 10+ for thousands of miles in the atmosphere. Neither were produced. Other methods were "good enough" at the time and cheaper.
Does anybody remember the Boeing SST (Super Sonic Transport) from the late 1960s? I was friends with an engineer, name Jim Hutton, who worked on that thing before it was canceled. He later gained minor fame as the designer of the overwing emergency escape hatch of the Boeing 737. They were named after him. The next time that you are a passenger on a 737 and the stewardess points out the emergency escape hatches, note that they are called the Hutton Hatches.
i would imagine frequant kid complaints are very much current and more severe in our kid friendly missile ridden eastern europeen general life now. i think the broken window is more reasurring then annoying, i mean if you're thinkinging of broken stuff pretty good indicator you're not military grade broken lol
When Obama was President, he came to Washington state. A Cessna pilot made the unfortunate decision to fly into closed airspace and jets were scrambled from McCord AFB. They wasted no time--going supersonic and creating four very loud sonic booms. People in my neighboorhood were freaking out, thinking there was some sort of terrorist attack. I tried to console them to no avail.
About hypersonic missiles, these are being designed to be medium to short-range, possibly submarine mounted. So, you are looking at potential submarine or ship-based nuclear weapons that would leave very minimal reaction time. These are not to replace bunker based ballistic missiles, but to increase the threat factor of preemptive strike
Yeah, she's like fresh air breath when you look at what is going on. People are insane. Climate change, Covid, Nuclear Fusion, AI optimists, etc. Science is dead. Common insanese. The funniest part is that in the most cases that was enough to be graduated in a regular school in order to stay resistant to all that pseudo "science - data based" bull shit.
Sabine, I would like to comment on your statement that in an evacuated tube high speeds are dramatically easier to achieve, in theory yes, but a major under-exposed issue is safety. The risk for an accidental cabin-decompression in the fragile pod moving at bullet speed in a near vacuum close to a heavy structure (tube) is far from negligible. Surviving cabin-decompression even with an oxigen mask at hand is not possible below a certain pressure (0.2 Bar?). U2-pilots needed to wear a space-suit for this very reason. When one would keep 20% pressure in the tube for safety, the air-drag (energy use) becomes equal or worse than that of an ordinary airplane cruising at altitude.
And just think about what happens, if you try to drive a curve. You would be pressed against the wall and smeared as bloody pulp all over the inside of the cabin.
Oh you can take turns for sure. At about 1 degree / kilometre probably :D Even before you get to the safety concerns though... there's the costs and the maintenance, and the tech. 1. So do we build a tube over land? How big? Materials also stretch in heat and fall victim to the elements... Hmmm. Or how about underground? Less elements to worry about. Maybe easier to regular temperature... Costs hundreds of millions to dig just hundreds of metres for a small tunnel and takes a looong time (Especially if you're the Boring Company). Then you've got the task of maintaining it... Not going to like that. 2. The tech? To create a vacuum good enough for supersonic and hypersonic travel. We're going to need a LOT of compressors. And they're going to have to be able to move about 200x more air than current best models... and run at about 1 thousandth of the power to be in constant use (yep... constant) without driving the costs way above interplanetary travel. Oh yeah and they have to be able to cycle airlocks in less than an hour (ha! good luck!) and you also need to be able to seal, compress, decompress etc. sections of tube/tunnel in the event of emergencies. In summary: Hyperloop is NEVER happening. :D
@@Unethical.FandubsGames I was about to give in to your argument, up to the last line. "In summary: Hyperloop is NEVER happening. :D" Because it just sounds like one of those smug statements just before big leaps in science. 640KB will be more than enough for everyone. God does not play dice. Not within a thousand years would man ever fly. If light were shone on a circular obstruction, a bright spot would appear in the centre of the shadow, as bright as if the obstruction were not there at all. Obvious nonsense! Big scientific leaps are highly correlated with high public opinion polarization. So, statistically, I should bet my money on hyperloops. Unfortunately, I am also aware that important conditions are different, whether significantly, that's left for the future to reveal. Maybe your smug statement is not as catchy as the others and that's why we won't have hyperloops.
You make a good case against hypersonic ICBMs having shorter travel times than ballistic ICBMs but I have heard some other TH-camrs like Millenium 7* make some other points in favor of hypersonic weapons, particularly for anti-ship missiles. First, at hypersonic speeds the missile has so much kinetic energy that even if the explosives failed to detonate a ship would take serious damage. Second, even small amounts of maneuverability or the ability to maintain a low altitude would make it impossible to predict a weapon's target, making it much harder to intercept or defend against. Third, a hypersonic missile moves fast enough that current missile defense technologies (ones which rely on shooting down the missile with a smaller missile) may not be able to destroy them even if they detect the incoming threat.
You are an amazing teacher. Quite a leap from particle physics and cosmology to Newtonian physics! This video is extremely informative. As usual, you have shot down the military’s hypersonic missile.😊 “Mahk” -real German diction.
You should watch the news all August. First please pray for Ning Li "The Mother of NASA's First EM Compression / Gravity Modification Drive" has passed away last week in Huntsville where she conducted secret warp drive research for DoD Black Projects! She deserved a Nobel Prize in Physics for work in creating the first working "Gravity Modification Drive". But due to secrecy the Pentagon SCREWED HER OUT OF THE NOBEL PRIZE! A concerned group of concerned vets have the tape of the century and the world is about to change forever. Complete analysis of the first video recording combat between US forces in Afghanistan and China's elite EM Compression Drive / "Artificial Gravity" Drone Force! There are 4 UAPs in the video which are unstoppable. They repel bullets and hellfire missiles. Part of this video has been released already. The boys at the Pentagon have NO CHANCE STOPPING THIS LEAK > SORRY BOYS! IT IS OVER NOW ! The first half of video released video shows 2 drones surviving a direct hit from a Hellfire missile attack attack by an A10! Like we just spit at it! The second part left off the first release (the edited part) shows Chinese Drones after surviving the hellfire attack leave the scene and COME BACK 2 minutes later and ON VIDEO they seemingly FCKING TELEPORT across the sky, but it is really just moving so fast the video frame rate can only catch the start and end point, not the actual move. We have confirmed the 80,000 feet in one second deal! These damn superconductor drives are amazing! The entire video is to be release the VET GROUP is having UAP experts do forensics to determine the operating specs on the drone. MAKE NO MISTAKE. THIS VIDEO IS SO GOOD YOU CAN SEE EXACTLY HOW THE EM COMPRESSION DRIVE WORKS! There are propulsion plumes but theey are wrapped in vortexing EM fields so you need to know what u r looking at! Hence the "experts" helping with forensics! They are based on Ning Li's drive and in 5 years 10 companies will be mass producing these for transportation! We are releasing the operational workings of all Skunkworks ad Chinese "Gravity Modification Drive" We are now in the world of functioning EM Drives / Artificial Gravity Drives! My father literally was in the firing room for Apollo 11 and personally knew Wernher von Braun and they ALL KNEW AT NASA the EM field caused gravity PERIOD! They established QKD Theory that describes the world with EM dipoles not magic! Space Time is not real but EM Compression Drives ARE VERY REAL! Gravity is caused by collisions of actual electromagnetic kinetic dipoles and spacetime is joke to keep the public from building WARP DRIVES which is basically what is inside these chinses drones. 50g's 20,000 mph in atmosphere and 100000 meters a second in deep space space! Just like DoD's Black Triangles have 3 glowing EM Compression "thrusters", these Chinese sub and truck launched drones use EM Compression Drives that use Microwaves the natural frequency of the EM Field Dipoles! The glowing hot gas around the drones is caused by the ~~75MHz EM Field RF Microwave "force field" heating the local atmosphere! The superconductor generated EM Field around these drones 2000 X times stronger than an MRI! Ever watcha fire extinguisher fly across a room into an MRI. Imagine that times 2000! But its a drone and you are carrying your own super magnet! The HIGH TESLA MICROWAVE RF also scrambles electronics of a our missiles. It' like sticking a guidance computer in a microwave oven and expect it to still work. I have seen an A-10 launched hellfire missile get disabled 20 feet from impacting the first drone and literally BOUNCE OFF the EM FORCE FIELD then it bounced of the second drone force field 20 feet away never touching the drone but the missiles course was altered 30 degrees in 100 feet by the intense EM GENERATED GRAVITATIONAL FIELD AROUNBD THE DRONE! Then it hits an afghan mountain ground unexploded. Drone didn't move at all! The Pentagon is scared and thus silent because they lost this EM Compression / Gravity Modification War! China Wins This Round! Taiwan is what they are after and will stop at nothing to take it. Even if they have to build 10000 warp drive drones to go it! This will happen quick because the Black Project contractors already know we have the video because they have been trying to hack our PCs ALL FCKN WEEK! By months end. You will pray I was WRONG!
@@johnboze OMG! WTF? YOU POSTED A WALL OF TEXT ABOUT THIS AMAZING VIDEO AND NOT A SINGLE LINK. STOP TEASING. I WAS MOST INTRIGUED BY THIS "EM GENERATED GRAVITATIONAL FIELD". SOUNDS LIKE SOMETHING FROM SCIENCE [PULP] FICTION.
Part of the weapons equation of a low flying hypersonic missile includes kinetic impact - a relatively small weapon, far smaller than an ICBM, could demolish say and nuclear powered aircraft carrier or any land based targets. Russia's hypersonic missiles deployed now are on warships - at least those are the ones we know about.
Hi SH, 2 thing with hyper missiles. 1) They can change direction, It's much easier to change direction in a slow moving car, at high speeds direction changes take much longer and the direction change is much slower, this would be the same for hyper speed vehicles. 2) Flying at low altitude, the air pressure close to sea level would create huge resistance and thus temperature, most likely a plasma around the structure, this would surely affect the missiles aiming and tracking equipment. Your thoughts on this please.
Yes, I always find discussion of the danger of hypersonic missiles a bit odd. It's hard enough to get a missile to go in a straight line without melting. Getting it to turn at those speeds without disintegrating is a completely different problem.
@@jeromedavies2408 The point of hypersonics is covering as much middle ground as fast as possible for naval use. A conventional missile will need some kind of assisted guidance from an aircraft to keep up to date information on target position or else the ship might completely flee outside of on board sensor ranges. This means that carrier groups could deploy their own aircraft to destroy the targeting aircraft or just pressure them into fleeing. Satellite only gives you a few minutes of coverage above the target. Launching a hypersonic allows the missile to get close enough to the ship to turn on its own sensors and slow down to conventional supersonic for terminal phase maneuvering.
if your target's route is unknown or hard to predict or it changes it's route, your interceptor needs to change path, and that means you need more kinetic energy in order to intercept, if the target is maneuverable enough (in other words it has enough kinetic energy), it can outperform the interceptor missile.
Programs have periodically been launched on this subject, starting with Reagan's Orient Express. The inadequacies of current materials are always the stumbling block, and - boom - big budget materials development efforts are launched. Materials engineers are assigned the impossible duty, and they try not to laugh. I was put in charge of Task 0 for one such program, a task meant to rationalize what was proposed to what is actually plausible. I vividly recall giving the conclusions at a very large meeting at NASA. Most of the proposed materials could be immediately dismissed with a 30-second calculation. They were only good as what I called "chart" materials, used to get funding or other for shenanigans. That was 30 years ago, and I'm talking only of supersonic speeds. I also worked on more secret hypersonic programs, where the only approach to the worst stagnation areas (leading edges) was using copper cooled by slush hydrogen. As you suggest, the way to go is to remove yourself from the air problem. Or even better, just stay home.
That only works with ICBMs. Nearer the surface... you have air to deal with. As for 30 year old tech... of course it didn't work. As for the concept being flawed, it depends on where you set you goal line. A Mach 5-6 air breather with a 250 mile range in a package the size of a Tomahawk cruise missile might well be plausible and create a nightmare scenario for a carrier fleet at see launched from a bomber wing. B-1 lancer can launch 22 cruise missiles. 8 B-1s could launch 172 in a swarm attack against a carrier fleet without ever comming within range of the fighter CAP. Rockets travelling at this speed Don't have that range. SCRAM jets do. That is the combat envelope where they are dangerous, not as a poor man's ICBM. She talks for many minutes on theory, then botches the proposed application rendering the entire argument pointless. I could use the same logic to prove that the internal combustion engine couldn't possibly work by not including the concept of the timing belt. Sorry. A pristine example of Junk Science. Get the calculations right then botch the application with one of the final sentences.... then arrive at a false conclusion. This is a standard fallacy used in logical arguments. Its also called "Razzle Dazzle" in the movie "Chicago". Its called B.S. most other places.
@@avgjoe5969 Let me think - have there been any significant jumps in structural materials over the past 30 years? No - and this was my sandbox, with PhD, doing R&D at a major aircraft engine company. Yes, some new stuff (see GE9X - CMCs come closest, and it appears they're using something for the first time from a project I led 30 years ago), but nowhere near the jump required for hypersonics. We need new elements for a big jump.
@@curtaustin8119 For hypersonics in the mach 10-12 range? I agree. However, there are a number of changes that have been made in cooling tech - the Skylon engine, the tests with hypersonic missiles done by the US and others. Consider Iconel and rocket bells that Spacex is using now at 330 bar with their Raptor engines. This does not even touch on the area of ceramics. So Yes, I think a sustained, long range, Mach 5-7 is definitely doable (my area was Metallurgical Engineering). Please be more specific in what speed range you refer to when you claim "it can't be done". The term "Hypersonic" straddles a very broad range. Keep in mind that the AIM-54 Phoenix had a rated speed of mach 5 sustained over 100 mile range... in the 1970s. Nor did it employ cryogenic bleed gasses to cool it... so pardon me if I choose to hotly disagree. The objective is to cut down the time a defensive system has to respond. A 5-7x reduction is quite good. You don't need a 10x reduction to be successful. Especially in a swarm-attack scenario. The objective is to saturate the defenses.
@@avgjoe5969 The video focusses on transport, not missiles, and that's the context of my remarks. I can easily consider Inconel - I worked in Inco's research lab after getting a PhD in metallurgy. I later worked for an aircraft engine manufacturer on various high temperature alloys, including those that go by the lofty term 'superalloy', deservedly. I once revisited the potential of refractory alloys with much higher melting points (Nb/Cb, mostly); good for short term use as rocket nozzles in a fuel-rich environment, but oxidation resistance is very poor. Yes, it's possible to wave your arms about protective coatings and that sort of thing, and persuade funding agencies to give you money. Neither a pessimist nor optimist, I did push a 'high flyer' sort of material where I saw hope - supposedly it is just now being introduced, 30 years later, enabled by 3D printing. I have an engine tested airfoil right here on my desk as a memento. Just trying to establish some credibility here.
Oh- something to 'pin' the situation: One of the high operational expenses of the Concorde was that the turbine disks of the engines had to be replaced frequently - they got hotter than they'd like, and they weren't cheap. They pretty much last forever in subsonic engines, though they get pushed hard. This is in the context of transport aircraft, not military fighters.
_Hypericum_ is a very nice genus of flowers with many pretty species, though St John's Wort has been over-hyped for use against depression. Only Samuel Taylor Coleridge ever had a hyperclimax.
That's certainly true of "Hyper Loop". Anyone who doesn't realize it's a scam to remove high-speed rail funding hasn't looked through the physics of it.
I think I’ve said it before. But for me it’s very important we have people like you who dares to say what almost no one says. So this honest approach shakes apparently some physics ( I’ve seen it) but I think it’s good because it’s so easy to get carried away. Pure respect for doing this
Yes I agree with you, still I think she showed some naivete, not covering anything Chinese or Russians, as their at the front of this technology, and it's looking like the US doesn't want it known.
I think you have a little misconception about hypersonic missiles. They're not a replacement for ICBMs. Think of hypersonic missiles more like harder to intercept (cruise) missiles with a range of ~ 100-500 NM. Something like a BGM-109 or a AGM-84, but harder to intercept. Especially on terminal run for impact, where todays missiles can be intercepted with defense weapons like a RIM-116 or even a Phalanx.
wow, to think that of all the videos i've watched, THIS channel would be the one to simplify what RamJet and ScramJet differences are in a way thats easy to remember. Thanks.
Thank you Sabine. The analysis you made is really nice one, and account for some lesser known (and by some intentionally omitted) aspects. I noticed in one point that you mentioned the low pressure tube as a mode of transport. I wonder will you be interested in researching the hyperloop?
As a former Aerospace and ballistic missile defense engineer I enjoy seeing some sense on hyper-sonic weapons. They have another problem which Sabine did not address, guidance. A hyper sonic device in air is totally isolated,. No radio communication can get through the plasma around it and no window material exists to enable imaging for guidance. Ballistic missiles have little problem with this thanks to lot of development of inertial guidance and a long mid course phase in space, in which they can get navigation updates up to re-entry. This is not trivial except when compared to the problem of guiding an endo atmospheric weapon. An endo-atmospheric hyper-sonic weapon has a severe accuracy problem. That is not an issue for terrorizing a civilian population, those nukes do not have to very accurate but to hit the retaliatory sites does requires great accuracy. In short strategic hyper-sonics do not change the nuclear balance and guidance is another reason. Smaller tactical hyper-sonics make sense as the impact energy is huge. Anti armor tank fired rounds are near hyper-sonic. Another device which has been consider, and may be worth a podcast is "The Rod of G-D", This is long rod dropped from orbit as mentioned Neal Stephenson's book "Anathem"
Sabine! Thanks so much for this discussion. Especially about hypersonic missiles. China’s recent testing of a hypersonic missile got heavy play on US media when our General Chief of Military Staff told Congress in a hearing that China’s test of a hypersonic missile isn’t quite a Sputnik moment, but comes close and is worth close scrutiny. Considering the real and present dangers to public health and economy posed by climate change, the info you shared helps cut through the normal hyperbole so we don’t get too wrapped around the axle by the self-sustaining narrative of, what Eisenhower called, the military industrial complex.
Ted Talks are always out there. They even let Solar Roadways talk. The antimatter bit was hilarious. It costs trillions per gram and we’ve never created and safely stored more than a few positrons. Thanks for the enlightening video. Love your vids. ❤️ More on thermodynamics please. I’m obsessed with entropy and the arrow of time.
Very interesting! But I need to comment one point 15:00 While earth being round is beyond discussion :), early warning radars are not really limited by earth's curvature. It would be quite useless and pathetic to have an "early" radar warning limited by horizon. Long range radars have range of hundreds or thousands km, using ionosphere as sort of waveguide, bending propagating radio wave with earth's curvature.
@@GP-qz6kk Good point! Thing is tad complicated. Problem is long range radars are rather imprecise. Sure, they give warning that something is coming, but not much beyond that. On top of that, if the target is flying sufficiently low, target echo tends to get covered by earth clutter echo (hills, buildings, forests, etc). So, yeah, flying low helps. High frequency (short waves) have better chance to detect low flying targets, but these are indeed limited by radio horizon (so they are short range). Radio horizon depends mostly on antenna height (higher antenna = higher radio horizon). Hence army introduced AWACS, big planes with powerful, short wave radars. Since they fly high in sky their radio horizon is significantly improved and since they use relatively short waves, they have big chance to detect even low flying target.
@@GP-qz6kk The reason is Earth horizon and fundamental physics. Unless you use over-the-horizon radars which bring in inherent wavelength limitations (you have to bounce them from ionosphere) - OTH radars works in tens of MHz frequency, while typical radars use GHz. This in turn relates to precision, cross-section and dimensions of targets that can be discerned and power budget. Some OTH radars are australian JORN or French th-cam.com/video/UDnPS6U5JX4/w-d-xo.html
Interesting as in a previous life I was a radar operator on the artic circle. I was stationed at several stations One at Bartar Island , Katovic we would send inteceptors, that was then and this is now the speeds have increased incredably. I love your subjects and I am always interested and love your interpetation and ability to explain in terms such as I can understand, Thank You and keep up the good work...
Debunking engineering stuff with a sharp scientific eye is great, I want more !! There are too many people talking nonsense about futuristic technologies, and rarer persons such as you that can temper the expectations with a rational thinking. So keep on and thanks for that !!
An easier way for people to understand stagnation temperature, is that it's essentially just "compression". It's not even _really_ drag as you'd normally think of drag, and not really friction exactly either. It's that the wedge at the front of the vehicle is compressing the air it's pushing aside. And at supersonic speeds, and especially hypersonic speeds, that compression can get very intense. And of course when you compress gas, it releases heat, decompress it, it absorbs heat. Long pointy noses alleviate this considerably, shoving air aside more gradually (less compression). But the nose isn't razor sharp, so there is a thin layer of air releasing a lot of heat. Air which was hit by the blunt tip (however small), and shoved aside at supersonic speed. As it passes over the airframe, it mingles with cooler less compressed air, and isn't so intense. Thus the heat being so concentrated at the leading edges, even if the angle of the wedge shapes looks the same further back. Technically every leading and trailing edge surface generates a sonic boom, not just the nose and tail. This makes supersonic aerodynamics 'Complicated'(tm). When you get up over mach 5 or 6, then you run into a bigger problem. Then it's not just the air hitting the leading edge which is shoved aside at supersonic speed, but the air hitting the entirety of any frontal wedge-shapes. Basically the supersonic shockwave is pushed up against the skin of the leading edges, well back from the very tip. This is some thoroughly violently compressed air, and it's pushed against the frontal areas (not just the tip) like a vice is holding it there. So instead of a little bit of supersonically compressed crazy-hot air tricking back from the very tip, and dissipating heat, it's the whole frontal area creating this effect. Heat levels are suuuper high. The SR-72 prototype has a shape which allows it to go up to mach 6, before the supersonic shockwave is butting directly against the skin of aircraft. If it exceeded that speed, and the supersonic shockwave ended up in contact with the skin of the aircraft (beyond just the tip) it would melt & burn up very rapidly. The reason for the 'squishy' definition of how fast is hypersonic, is because it depends on the edge angles on the front of the vehicle. Missiles or reentry vehicles (anything which is 'single-use') can cheat this problem, by simply being disposable, and doin their job quickly, before they entirely melt. Just give them a thick skin, and design them around finishing their job before they fall apart. Space shuttle is a rare exception, where it's tiles allow it to just absorb and endure the heat, for enough seconds to perform reentry, and then dissipate it after. Although a space shuttle is too hot on the outside to approach for hours after landing. The astronauts would stay inside for a while, so they're safe from the skin of the shuttle. Anyway, the issue of speed with the space shuttle was not going into orbit (which you describe accurately as leaving the atmosphere before getting too fast), but reentry, where it _does_ fly in atmosphere at mach 25. But it rapidly decelerates. During the "space plane" R&D, it was very important that such a craft get into orbit quickly. Because heat tiles can only absorb the heat for a very limited time without saturating and melting down the interior like a plane-shaped crucible. It didn't just have to be able to get to orbit, but do so rapidly. Quite an engineering problem really. A mach 8 passenger aircraft, which wants to go to mach 8 and sit there for 30 minutes, is frankly absurd. As for the threat of hypersonic missiles. The concern is for 2 types of devices: - hypersonic cruise missiles, which fly at high mach (5-8, maybe 10) inside the atmosphere, and travel to their target too rapidly to be easily engaged by missile defenses (particularly ship based missile defenses). This can be compensated for to a large extent, because the turning potential at that speed is abysmal, so defenses can lead the target considerably. But it does require defenses to act far too rapidly to double or triple check exactly what it is they're shooting at. Making tragic mistakes quite likely. - hypersonic glide vehicles, which while slightly slower than regular reentry vehicles, do require more complex anti-balistic missile systems to engage, because they do change path. Also, they could be used to obfuscate their point of origin, or use less obvious flight paths to go around defensive systems. Something like this could be used to go around a defensive network. Or even to spoof attacks so as to make them appear to come from uninvolved nations. This is very unhelpful to world peace. It is somewhat overhyped though, yes. At least as far as military targets are concerned. Mostly hypersonic weapons endanger civilian aircraft, and uninvolved nations. They're not _overtly_ more dangerous to their targets, given appropriate tweaks are made to defensive systems. What is FAR more destabilizing and problematic for world peace, is an orbital bombardment system. Which unfortunately China recently tested. Also Russia's nuclear super torpedo... it's much harder to defend against. But more importantly, it makes identifying the attacking party very difficult. For now, the use of such a device would obviously be by Russia. But if anyone else develops a similar device, then you have the potential for WWIII mixed with a guessing game about which country is attacking. Which is actually (remarkably) more problematic than just a regular WWIII. To be fair, the US stealth bomber raises some of the same concerns. While the very high risk of the cold war may be over, we're entering a technological phase where there's greatly increased risk simply because of the possibility of temptation by a bad actor, to think they might be able to use nuclear weapons without being the one to be blamed for it (or retaliated against). Whether they are correct or not, that temptation is no bueno.
Thank you for this video, it contains a lot of useful information. However, I think dismissing the hypersonic threat on account of these weapons' IR signature is a bit cavalier. Being able to detect something and being able to get a lock on it with a system that can actually destroy it are two VERY different things. Here, you would need to have a network of satellites with IR sensors covering all of your territory 24/7, and you'd need them to be able to transmit targeting data to anti-missile missiles in real-time, allowing them to get close enough to incoming hypersonic missiles to eventually get a lock thanks to their own IR sensors, while adapting to any evasive maneuvers the incoming hypersonic missile might perform, both before and after getting within line-of-sight of it. As far as I know, the defensive systems required to do this simply do not exist at this time. Perhaps they could be developed, and perhaps they would work reasonably well, but everything about this is harder than intercepting ballistic missiles, which is already very hard: you have to work with a distributed system and only rely on the anti-missile missile's IR sensor once you're within line of sight, you have to worry (more) about the atmosphere, and you have to account for unpredictable trajectories. So basically, hypersonic systems make an already very difficult interception task even harder.
The accuracy of being able to target a hypersonic missile might be improved if instead of anti missile missiles lasers were used from satellites so as to strike the missiles outside the atmosphere. To be more certain of hitting the target, instead of a straight beam of energy have the beam scan around in a circular arc of the predicted area the missile should be. Since the laser energy would be traveling at the speed of light there would be only a little bit of difference from firing of the laser to where the missile would be but scanning from a point just ahead of prediction in a circular motion would likely strike it. Keeping the laser focused on the missile after the first laser strike might be a problem but more scans and heating of the missile from the strike could be detected by infrared sensors, to predict the path of the missile and enable further more strikes continuously until the missile was totally destroyed.
@@grgmetube Yes, but powerful lasers are hard to make, especially in space, and weather conditions can complicate things quite a bit. And you'd need a lot of these satellites to protect your airspace. It might be doable, but it's certainly not easy.
@@Lexoka If you use lasers in space there is no atmosphere or very minute amount to produce weather problems. The idea is to destroy the missiles while they are outside the atmosphere, part of there trajectory.. The enrgy could come from solar to power the lasers. They would only be using energy while they shooting which would be a small amount of time compared to the time building up enough charge from solar enrgy. The voltage could be built up from capacitors and diode chains. Although some quite large high farad capacitors would be needed. There might be better ways to utilize the solar energy for lasers that I am unaware.
As always, excellent. Thank you. One small point because the seeming endless 'loop of hyperbole' makes me grumpy. The concept of a hyperloop makes no engineering sense at all while being at very best right on the edge of what physics may allow.
Sabine--I follow aerospace developments very closely so I was interested to see how you would handle a topic out of your usual areas of expertise, but I could find no error in anything you said. Very, very impressive. (I am speaking as a fan!)
Then you must follow it with your head, somewhere the sun don't shine . Because she didn't have the Chinese and Russians as the focus of the video, America is along way back in the rankings, N Korea is probably further ahead. hehe. If the US had the technology, then Biden would of sold it to them anyway
This morning my various news feeds were filled with alarming headlines about China surprising the U.S. with a nuclear-capable hypersonic missile test. By coincidence (or perhaps not?) your video showed up in my TH-cam feed a few hours later. Thank you for putting this headline in proper perspective. You have a new subscriber!
I thought the danger of long range hypersonic weapons was the hypersonic maneuvering final flight stage to target which makes kinetic interceptions difficult.
The problem with maneuvering at the final flight stage is that hypersonic flight in atmosphere heats the air so much that it generates a layer of plasma. This layer of plasma hinders communication between the missile and the outside world, so the missile is effectively flying "blind". Interceptions will be difficult, but guiding the missile to a target will be difficult as well.
Thank you, Sabine, I love what you're doing! One little thing: 30' from US to Frankfurt? Simply put that means 11-12' of continuous acceleration and 11-12' of continuous deceleration during the flight. This for a lay person not for fighter pilot or a F1 pilot? Well, this guarantees a severe muscle fever (at least) at the neck muscles in the next days. I'll bet a normal passenger would not board that plane again! Ever! :)))
This really deserves more likes. I was going to do the math (did you take in account the deceleration?), and point out that hypersonic speeds will probably never be feasible for passenger transportation. Plus, the seats would be able to turn backwards for deceleration. Never mind using on inboard bathroom.
@@loremipsum7ac When I studied Aerospace Engineering in the 90s, hypersonic transport was all the "hype". But once you see, how little acceleration a normal passenger is willing to endure for comfort reasons (1.1-1.2 g maximum for prolonged times) it becomes clear, that this is really not viable at all. This fact was pointed out by one of my professors back then, but seems to be conveniently forgotten, every time someone writes a research grant for this kind of transport...
Well, we apparently live in a world where otherwise (apparently) sane YT presenters casually discuss the idea of using Starship for point to point passenger travel, so I guess anything goes...
@@luggiduggi Interesting point. In fact, if you set (say) 1G as your maximum acceleration, that more or less defines the quickest possible time between any two points, no matter what technology is being proposed. Anything that can go faster than that, simply isn't going to be usable. And, I suspect, in reality the sustained acceleration most people would put up with for more than a few minutes would be a lot less than 1G. I remember thinking exactly this when I first saw the Hyperloop proposal - maximum speed isn't defined by the technology or fuels or whatever, it's limited by passenger comfort.
@@paulhaynes5029 Spot on! You know, what I want from Musk & Space Community is not a vehicle able to crawl 1+ years towards Mars (I couldn't care less about that ultra hyped topic) but to produce a space vehicle able to transport 4 people for regular service of Hubble Space Telescope and bring them home alive (this is a significant and mandatory demand!). This is because after all these years the good old HST still has life in it and also, the new and long time awaited James Webb Space Telescope has a close but different radiation range. Yeah, wishful thinking.
2nd visit here, was affraid will be as confused as the first time but this I did understood. Yaay! Well put together, checking the details step by step, loved it. Thanks for the effort put into it, subbed.
Thank God for you Sabine. As an Air Force brat who grew up immersed in the idiotic cold war mentality, it is obscene and you are absolutely correct that we have better things to worry about. I'm so glad that, unlike many American engineers, a physicist such as yourself has not been dazzled by the supremely wasteful and unethical "defense" industries.
I was with you when you laughed out loud at the antimatter idea but then to suggest Hyperloop as something viable? As a physicist, I'm sure you're aware of the practical difficulties in maintaining even a soft vacuum with volumes such as the LHC. Let alone volumes required to provide feasible travel routes. Surely it makes much more sense to use extremely high altitudes instead? I was interested to see Virgin Galactic pull off a "zero G" parabolic flight well into the stratosphere. But rather than marvelling at the illusion of the passengers "escaping earth's gravity" as they apogeed "in space", I was much more intrigued by the possibility of plotting a trajectory optimised for distance, rather than altitude and freefall.
@@davidwarford3087 I am not an engineer, but believe the hyperloop has no problems with material strength like a hypersonic aircraft does. We could easily build the vacuum chambers and the pods and they would theoretically be fine traveling even at very high speeds as you don't have the air problem. The main deal-breaker problems for the hyperloop are maintaining the vacuum in the very large continuous chamber, an efficient way to put and remove pods into the system while maintaining the vacuum, and the catastrophic failure of the whole line in the event of an unintentional depressurization of the tube (at any point the air problem could be violently reintroduced into the system whether by negligence, accident, or malicious intent). Sub-orbital space flight at hypersonic speeds is at least theoretically possible and I see no glaringly obvious reason why it couldn't even be practical. The main problems for it is most likely economics (and maybe environmentalism with its fuel usage XD), not physics or engineering.
@@imacds Well, consider your 'beliefs' to be considered heresy and start with watching Mythbusters pumping air out of wagon and and learning about Magdeburg spheres.
In fact, nothing is viable with current technology, vacuum trains like Hyperloop are actually one of the most realistic: technically possible but not economically. Putting people into ballistic missiles is another option, but the individual costs would be absurd, it could only work as a joyride for the ultra-rich. Even the much more accessible, technically proven supersonic flight is not economically viable so we stopped doing it.
@@gubx42 a TH-cam channel called Adam Something has a very good video on the impractibility of the hyperloop, mainly from a standpoint of logistics and city planning. He routinely criticises the ideas of Elon Musk, which is a breath of fresh air from the common internet perception of him as a god like figure
It has little meaning, hypersonic is mach 5 and above and depends on sound speed which is dependent on the air your craft is in, no sound speed in space
@@alwaysdisputin9930 : No. As Sabine explained, the speed mach N depends on the medium. Mach N is N times the speed that a sound propagates through the specified medium. But sound does not propagate through a vacuum, so the definition breaks down there.
I think I'd rather a bigger atom-smasher than faster missiles; maybe we should somehow convince the world's military powers that the Ultimate Weapon is in fact a massive particle-collider on the Moon.
@@aniksamiurrahman6365 That is for the advancement of humanity. I'm thinking of keeping the warmongers out of the way and distracted. Maybe the telescopes on the outside whilst the particle collider is built inside, along the circumference.
Well...yes and no. The concorde was a service aimed at the HYPER rich and where not interested in lowering the costs of the flight. The whole plane was in fact first class seats only. Modern cattle-ification of the traverlers would lower the costs per seat significantly. What we really need to think about righ tnow is: Do we really need to travel that fast?
The lack of demand was because of restricted routes. If you are thinking there aren’t enough people who would prefer to fly LA to NYC in two hours instead of six, then I would guess you’ve never taken that flight. And that’s the whole point of new super sonic research and design, to make the planes quiet enough to fly over populated areas. More routes means a greater supply, so the price will go down. That’s basic microeconomics.
I understood that maintenance was a key issue. Also, a plane would fly, say, London to NYC, then, instead of turning around and flying passengers the other way would sit on the ground for a day. That increases capital costs for a given number of flights. I understood that the two were related.
You see, problem is that even in mid-80s we already had vastly superior engines ( GE YF-120 ) to Rolls Royce Olympus mounted on Concorde. Enlarged concorde with 4 of them today could comfortably supercruise at say, Ma 1.6 without afterburner.
You should make another video about the hilarious designs of the hyperloops, as they have about the same likelihood to be used in any commercial sense as antimatter.
It sounds like she thinks they are a possibility since she suggested them as a viable alternative. Why anyone would think they are any more likely I don’t know.
The Sabine short giggle should be used more often when things that are completely batshit crazy don't need any further explanation! It's very effective at conveying the message!
The Sabine Giggle should absolutely be a meme, although now we are in the part of history where The Onion said they were going out of business because the real news was stupider than anything they could come up with, the Sabine Giggle would be heavily overused. Might need to limit it to Persons Foolish About Physics.
Thank you Sabine for a concise and thorough presentation on the physics of hypersonic flight. As you pointed out the threat of these weapons is not necessarily a strategic one for the US military ... but you failed to point out the tactical implications of such a missile. On July 19, 2021 a Russian 3M22 Tsirkon cruise missile was launched from a warship and travelled 350 KM @ mach 7 and hit a target. This test was the missiles final test before being declared fit for full deployment with the Russian navy and air force .... including submarines. You are correct that this weapon doesn't necessarily change the balance of power in regards to Russia's ability to strike the US mainland ... They've had that capability all along. It is however a deadly threat to the USA ability to project power via aircraft carriers ... the keystone to the USA's ability to fight wars outside their borders. The Pentagon is very good at picking the pocket of the taxpayer ... this is why hypersonic weapons are sold as an existential threat to American taxpayers when the real threat is to the Pentagons ability to wage war anywhere in the world from 50,000 ft.
Sabine, against the hype you said that Russias hypersonic missiles are not really that special. And 1 1/2 years later those missiles failed hard in Ukraine and you were proven very right. Well done. :)
Missing the point on hypersonic missiles, you're not looking at shorter distances, and that is what a lot of these missiles are being developed to do. At a shorter distance the target as no time to react until it is gone. Most of these hypersonic missiles are being developed for anti ship purposes. Or other land based targets that have no defense against such a fast moving object.
Since this video only concerned itself with the military's delusions of what hypersonic missiles might be used for, the military is to blame for using long distances as a reason to get funding for their new toys. If they were to be used against relatively close targets, the military discourse certainly does not reflect that in any shape or form!
All the "military discourse" I've heard about hypersonic missiles has been exclusively related to anti-ship weapons, comparing them to subsonic cruise missiles. The threat of anti-shipping weapons is very, very real, having been demonstrated repeatedly against military and civilian assets.
@@thatguy6054 Particle beams already being deployed can of course shoot down hypersonic conventional attacks. At near light speed Particle beam weapons are point and shoot. Conventional auto cannon already defending against supersonic jet missiles and artillery shells and probably can handle it as well. Ships might need to keep a radar plane up like they already do to insure the weapons pointed the right way. missileexited particularimposable
@@hakon_dlc Both the Russians in the Chinese have tested hypersonic missiles for anti-ship purposes. Russia has actually done submarine launches, of these missiles. The military discourse as you put it, certainly does show their concern because these missiles as of this time have they have no way to be stopped there is no defense against them. The American navy, sees them as aircraft carrier killers.
@@RedRocket4000 You have been reading way too much science fiction. The best we have are laser based weapons. And these are still being tested, and only a few ships have them. Even these weapons have no chance to stop them if they are traveling short distances. By the time they know it's coming it's already hit them.
*Excellent video:* The ability to get a reliable internet connection and a comfortable seat on a conventional, old-fashioned train would probably do far more to improve traveler's journeys than flying around the world in sealed metal tubes at crazy speeds than anything else.
you are so right...reminds me of the time they 'sped up' the lifts in the Empire State by installing mirrors in the foyer...they had identified the actual problem (complaints about waiting-times) and in a stroke of possibly accidental genius, went right to the real problem: the complaining...the mirrors distracted the users and the complaints stopped...in your scenario, the complaint would be around 'time taken', and the mirrors - the internet connection...
Hmm.. I feel I have to correct this. HGV's aren't really about speed, they're about defeating missile defence systems. To do this HGV's use (speed obviously but also) innovative control surfaces to approach targets with odd trajectories that confuse conventional intercept systems. HGV's are not for really attacking stationary targets but for defeating aircraft carriers etc. HGV's spend the last 10 miles or so of their approach (which they travel in a matter of seconds) at very low altitude following a non-ballistic trajectory. The only way the US could effectively engage China in conventional warfare is by Sea. HGV's effectively preclude this option. To quote someone clever : "The good thing about HGV's is that they make conventional warfare almost impossible. The bad thing is that they make conventional warfare almost impossible"
HGVs do not approach the target at low altitudes. Going at hypersonic speeds at those altitudes for any significant period of time destroy missiles. It would also be pointless to only sea skim for the last 10 miles. They are also still very counter-able, since they have very large IR and radar cross sections and approach at high altitudes, meaning that defense systems can engage them from very far away. Systems like AEGIS can deal with them, albeit they do require a decent expenditure of munitions to do so. Generally the real reason behind adopting hypersonics is to compensate for inconsistent or short term ISR. If you can only reliably get targeting data from a LEO radar satellite or a soon-to be destroyed drone that will give you a few minutes worth of time to get a missile onto target, a hypersonic weapon will be able to get there before that targeting info “runs out”. In contrast, a military like the US, which can generally rely on having consistent targeting data through naval air power can use subsonic VLO munitions like the LRASM, which likely actually perform better than hypersonics in a ASM role.
When I was studying physics in university I reached the class when they explained us the jet engine workings and I was beyond total amazement. It blew my mind literally. Then the pure genius of the diffusion pump finished blowing the rest of what was left of my brains.
Judging by the plaster on your knuckle you were in a fight. Judging by your face you won. I'm currently looking for a picture of a proponent of a new higher energy particle accelerator with a black eye.
You are very observant! Alas, I scratched my hand rather ungloriously pulling out my carry on item from an overhead compartment in a very subsonic airplane.
@@SabineHossenfelder & I was already scared that you tried to tear down the fourth wall. ^.^ , °{ I could almost hear the bang. By the way ... great earrings! (8)}
@@SabineHossenfelder stop the deception please!!! We all know you stuck your hand out of the cockpit of the new Mach 7 fighter... 'overhead compartment', yeah, right. =)
Why waste Antimatter - once we can actually store significant amounts - on travel in the atmosphere? Traversing the Solar System in a matter of weeks would be much more interesting!
Even for point-to-point travel, you may as well just go suborbital with a spaceplane if you have that level of technology. Heat shielding wouldn't even be a concern because with that much energy available, you can just use some giant stupid electromagnets to keep those pesky plasma fronts off your hull.
For now, anti-matter is mainly an unbelievably costly way to store energy. It woukd take virtually infinite ressources to create enough antimatter to fly anything, and would demand luch more energy input than output. The potential for space travel is indeed huge in a distant future, but to talk about going to New York with an antimatter jet is just laughable.
@@IZn0g0uDatAll yah right now I'm counting on fusion reactors to create light particles that leave the engine at a significant portion of c to shorten the travel time between Earth and the outer planets to a year or two possibly to happen in my lifetime...
@@nicolaiveliki1409 it’s quite impossible to predict what technology will look like tbh. I’m quite certain 1960 people would have been very surprised to learn we would still use chemical rockets in 2020. If we look at general trends, those technologies have massively slowed down their progresses (compare 1900 and 1960 and 1960 and 2020). It might be that this trend will carry on and that we won’t find much better than what we have now for a while. On the other hands, information technologies were completely impossible to predict 50 years ago. A smartphone would be white magic for a 1960 person. In Isaac Asimov novels, people 30 thousand years in the future use written documents and travel to other planets to visit libraries. Anyway, all of that to say that making any kind of predictions is hazardous at best.
@@IZn0g0uDatAll fusion drives are in reach technologically. They don't even have to be economically efficient (because no cosmoaviation propulsion system really is) they just have to reach better specific impulse and the engine itself has to provide for more propulsion relative to its weight. I'm saying 'just' but it is a steep engineering hurdle, though we know it's possible in principle
Hi Sabine, you came into my YT feed and I'm so glad you did as I thoroughly enjoyed this vlog. I am not a scientist, just an ordinary layman interested in aeronautics and astronomy. You presented a complex topic in an informative manner with a bit of dry wit added for good measure! New subscriber here!!
!0:36 It's great to see you laugh! I had come to believe you never did... Awesome video! Just one observation people usually miss: The speed of sound depends on the square root of the temperature, so the higher you fly, the smaller it becomes. Thus, it isn't the same to measure Mach at sea level than at the higher altitudes these planes would fly. There's another issue: The higher you fly, the greater your exposure to cosmic rays becomes. Concorde had an alarm system to dive to a lower altitude if the cosmic rays were exceedingly strong due to some solar event.
That humor was hyper-dry...
I'm still trying to process the implied existence of an 'unskeptical' Sabine.
Lol xD
@@LukeBunyip An unconscious one.
She is hyper smart
... Could it be that I saw little green men when I had breakfast? Hypersonic maybe 🤣
The antimatter thing was just so awesomely casual. "Let's use antimatter and... you know... e=mc^2 so that's a lot of energy"
Well if you need a lot of energy in a tiny package, "let's use antimatter" is your go-to. ;)
Where we're going... we don't need energy.
So many people have talked about it! ...)
The problem with antimatter could be summed up in three points:
1. Antimatter is quite difficult to create, it requires huge particle accelerators to achive a reasonable amount of antimatter that could sustain flying.
2. Using antimatter as a source of fuel is inadequate, since every time you create an antimatter you create regular matter as well, so the energy input is just ridiculous compared to alternative sources.
3. How would you be able to store antimatter on a vehicle - that is fundamentally made from regular matter- without annihilating them both, not just that but rather how would you be able to transport it from particle accelerators to the vehicle with annihilating it with the air and the universe as a whole.
Due to the previous reasons antimatter isn't a proper solution to hyper-sonic vehicles fuel problem. However i think it may be wise to use such tech in space-related propulsion systems to achieve interstellar travel.
@@saudyassin5352 .. While I agree, and would add faster planes are a luxury we don't need, antimatter can be stored in a strong magnetic field that can also be used to direct antimatter to matter in a controlled manner, heating up a heat engine + generator combination.. Nuclear power makes the most sense, power-to-weight-wise, but obviously we don't want flying dirty bombs that potentially damages stewards who work on the flights everyday.. Would require far less emissions though... Personally I think we need more CO2 in the atmosphere so Kerosene is good enough for me.
I’m a former aeronautical engineer and found this very interesting - thanks SH! Loved the TED talk giggles. Pissed about the wasted billions on hypersonic weapons that could do so much good elsewhere.
Commercial airliners are flying with same speed as 50 years ago aside from brief semi-succesful Concorde. It is much easier to do hypersonic in missiles. Because they are expendable so you can add 1 or 2 booster stages to reach desired speeds to kick in ramjet.
here here 🥂👍
Do you know about the work of Jean-Pierre Petit?
I giggled just before she did! Antimatter! With a straight face?
The title "aeronautical engineer" is taken by credulous laymen to mean something decent, but those of us who have studied military history understand it the equivalent of "bullet designer" or "chemical weapon designer."
Hi Sabine What a great talk. I am a retired professor of Aerospace Engineering and I used to teach courses on hypersonic aerodynamics and spacecraft design ( including hypersonic glide vehicles). Thus I have watched with dismay the current hype being generated about hypersonic glide military missiles. Your comments are spot on.
One thing no one mentions is the enormous fuel load that sustained hypersonic flight in the atmosphere takes , leaving little left for payload.
It just goes to prove that you're missing something, professor! The Khinjal is real; it's no hype. It has proven itself in the battlefield and they are very hard to detect before it's too late.
@@NedBoukharine They are just "hard to detect" because there has been not the proper investiment (read "cash") applied towards detection: dedicated infrared detection satellites or whatever else science can come up with.
@@Allbbrzwell yes but there are or should be two discussions here: do these weapons provide an edge as of today (discussion 1) and do they provide an edge for the foreseeable future (discussion 2). It seems to me 1 is an obvious yes and 2 an obvious no (after watching this video). But I would caution against the classic scientific complacency that because something can be done because white paper science has proven it doesn’t mean it can be engineered easily or quick or cheap or all of the above. Classic misunderstanding between researchers and real world people with real world problems. Russians hypersonic missiles today are a real threat and break the MAD doctrine, in a nuclear war as of today they would prevail, or so it seems. Happy to hear more arguments. Finally I would have liked to hear SH talk about the MHD which apparently has made these weapons possible
@@Allbbrz You just added water to my windmill! Of course to each and every ill there's a cure. Cancer is a still a killer til we find a cure, friend.
@@gd7163 I concur. It'd be nice to see a MHD vid by SH to learn more.
Seriously, was that guy doing the Ted talk supposed to be an expert in the topic? The way he throws in nuclear fuel and anti-matter for hypersonic flights reminds me of scriptwriters who sprinkle in the word "quantum" to make an idea sound sciencey.
well, that's TED talks for you...
TED Talks Exposed ! 🚀😂
@@EffySalcedo The REAL truth behind TED talks. WHAT THEY DON'T WANT YOU TO KNOW!!!
Sabine’s laughter which followed his statement answers your question!
That REALLY disappoints me about TED Talks. Bummer!!
14:59 loved the ‘The earth is round’ bit 😂
(X) Doubt
No proof though!
(settle down, it's a joke...)
I always trusted Sabine before she said that, why would she fall for the globers' conspiracy?
She said that to get a rise out of the flattards, I like her sense of humour.
My favorite aspect of your presentations is your skepticism. I love science but the enthusiasm for new theories is stunning.
That's until the skepticism is around her own theories that is, then her tune completely changes
That laugh! You know you've screwed up really badly if Sabine laughs at you. I love this channel.
@@kalicacao Way to stay on her good side, when you feel like saying something stuff your mouth full of cotton. It'll dry your mouth out but she can you 6" tall for speaking what little mind you have.
… But thinking the hyperloop is a better idea is equally retarded.
@@stefanbaar87 You think so? I took it as "this retarded hyperloop" is more viable.
Well he didn't really screw up. She just framed it in a way that made it seem like he did - as though he was saying that hypersonic flight would require antimatter, but that's not what he was saying. And she left out the sentence right before that clip from the talk where he said "Now let's look far down the technology road." He then emphasized that he was referring to "some form of safe nuclear energy". He just used antimatter as an example and then acknowledged that "this is far out there but this is technology people are working on". In the comments under the video, he wrote that it "may be 50 or more years away but I anticipate it will happen eventually. There are researchers and start-ups today with good ideas for harnessing antimatter for propulsion applications. It's worth doing some research on the subject." I don't see anything wrong with what he was actually saying.
@@GumbyTheGreen1 Thanks for the update as I got the feeling he was basically saying "we can fuel this using magic and fairy dust". I'm exaggerating, but "dark matter" is still theoretical, at best.
I loved her laugh in response to an engineer talking about antimatter fuel.
I don't understand the laughs. Every single ship of the Star Fleet uses antimatter, madam.
@@karekarenohay4432 she is from 21st century. she can't understand
@@jgunther3398 Right. And with Sabine's attitude we would still sit in dark caves and eat raw flesh, because "fire" -- ha ha ha, will never happen.
@@helmutheller1538 Fire happens in nature and is there for all to see. Have you ever seen anti-matter?
@@johnarnold893 John, this was an analogy! We are no longer cave dwellers who need to see with their own eyes everything to be able to imagine its existence. Have you ever seen an electron? And yet, you (and we all) use them and control them all the time nowadays.
Still, that mindset that Sabine shows is comparable to cave dwellers who had not yet mastered fire. If they had had her mindset back then, we would still live in caves today!
Anti-matter, atom by atom, exists at CERN, although I never saw it and probably never will.
Thank you Sabine. I'm a former aerospace engineer and am frustrated by the hype and misinformation surrounding this subject. Your expose was fantastic, beautifully dry and very timely. Thank you again for making and posting this.
@Stephen Clark
Do you remember the NACA report number about the equations and graphs in compressible flow?
NACA TR 1135 ?
I NEVER miss a video.
Thank you for all your hard work Dr. Hossenfelder.
Thank you Sabine. I really appreciate your pragmatic and honest perspective. Your presentation and production techniques are outstanding.
Please keep them coming ♥️
Sabine, as usual, excellent talk. An article pointed out two other aspects of hypersonic missiles: the plasma in front of the missile is easily seen by radar, and the energy needed to change direction (unpredictable movement) is so immense it is not feasible
As an engineer, I'm happy that Sabine covered an engineering topic today. A welcome respite from theoretical physics and physics-bashing. I particularly liked the way Sabine explained the engineering challenges to a non-technical audience.
Oh, and she used equations! IMO, you _have_ to use equations if you want to explain a technical topic concisely and precisely. 👍
I am glad you like it. This video was quite a challenge but I learned a lot along the way! Notably, I had no idea that the temperature rises so much so quickly.
@@SabineHossenfelder I'm sure I speak for many fans when I say I was thoroughly satisfied with the bashing-quotient contained herein. That will keep me going all week. :D
Physics-bashing? Clearly you don't know what you're talking about - she is one of the very few physicists doing their damnedest to PROTECT physics from the fantasists.
@@SabineHossenfelder Blame Bernoulli.
@@chuckschillingvideos Maybe he mean Physicists-bashing? I can very well imagine Sabine doing that...
I dreamed today that a friend skipper asked me why he cannot increase the speed of his boat a lot even with the new larger engine. I looked into his data and answered him that this is too close to the speed of light and he needs to use the relativistic equation. This is what physicists dream about 😬
Ha 😂
@@SabineHossenfelder After watching the video, I now suspect he must have powered his boat with antimatter 🤔
Daydream or sleeping dream? Also, did you verify that the anchor was aweigh?
@@brothermine2292 A real dream. I even remember his name was Captain Pandemux. I realized the connotation only when I woke up 😀
I once dreamed a monkey crushing me at near speed of light at the event horizon. The monkey was so blue-shifted, it turned into same condition as the moment after big bang where no photon existed. I am not even a physicist.
This video was great! One small thing: The dissociation of molecules is actually an effect that helps the vehicle to reduce the temperature in the stagnation point.
Reentry vehicles try to maximize this effect by using blunt edges, so that the shockwaves distance to the vehicle allows the full dissociation, which absorbs some part of the energy.
So dissociation is good for hypersonic flight and is a precondition that we need to make reentry work.
11:12 Hyperloop? Please, do tell. You occasionally debunk various technologies, even did so in this video. Hyperloop has been debunked by several prominent youtubers, the fact that you're for it is very intriguing. I would love to see you make a video about the topic, addressing the concerns of these debunkers.
Well, I'm not sure what hyperloops are, but she just mentioned them as an aside in this video, so I wouldn't really take that as a well-researched endorsement of the technology. And she was speaking in relative terms, saying it "makes more sense" not "it makes practical sense", so I wouldn't take it as an endorsement in absolute terms either.
Debunkers have mentioned convincing points such as:
- lower capacity over time than trains despite higher speed
- potential for quick catastrophe with even one little technical failure (trains can usually switch tracks in time or be re-routed, straight and rare tubes do not offer this flexibility)
- immense construction costs
- lack of necessity
It's a bit like Elon Musks system for transporting tesla cars on singular pods. Unnecessary and less efficient than a train on which you can load your car. Or his weird car tunnel that turned out to be a regular tunnel with some colourful lights in it. Welcome to modern "innovation."
Mainly daft ones like thunderfoot. Even then not so much debunked as repeatedly pointed out the same potential risks, mocked some students test rigs and gasped annoyingly.
Hyperloop offers a theoretical path to high-speed ground-level (or below-ground level) transportation. It is equivalent to re-creating the edge of space in a tunnel. The challenge is converting that theoretical possibility into a practical mode of transportation. Without economic viability, you won't be able to get investors to fund really smart people to develop the technology. Most likely, it will take a country like China, whose government doesn't have to worry about profitability, to create a working hyperloop -- if they develop any interest in it. In that regard, the video is accurate -- the theory of reducing air friction to achieve high speeds may be more promising than creating planes that have to face incredible air friction to travel at high speeds.
@@uhmnope4787 She did mention the idea of excavating the tube rather than constructing the pressure vessel underground. I honestly don't understand why that hasn't been the predominant area of development considering it solves the issue of building infrastructure over land already in use, and (I'm not an engineer so any who are reading this, please correct me if I'm wrong) I'd imagine solid rock coupled with some insulation against moisture and cracks would be much more reliable as a vacuum chamber. I understand the problem of upfront cost but as you said its already prohibitively expensive compared to regular train lines.
Looking forward to those antimatter-powered airplanes. Someone remind me, what's the current cost of antimatter again, and how do we store it?
Just toss it in your magnetically shielded anti-gravity dark-matter-lined bunker silo.
Very carefully
Physics Girl mentioned a 2700 trillion for gram tag. Not sure about currency, though. Hopefully they could be venezuelan bolivars!
Obviously we need to bring in Dan Brown to consult on the matter.
Ah yes, the same argument was made for Aluminum. Most expensive substance on Earth (at the time.)
The space shuttle especially returns with very large Mach numbers into the atmosphere. It is shaped in a way so that the boom becomes detached, like a bow wave.
And exactly the problem you were describing about very large temperatures occuring at stagnation, is actually adressed by its design. The underside is protected by the black coloured tiles - they can sustain the largest temperature. The rest of the shuttle is protected by white coloured tiles, they sustain less temperature. BUT at the wingtips and even the tail, you can find spots with the black tiles. That are the areas where the boom actually hits the space shuttle and therefore needs extra protection to withstand the stagnation temperature.
Sometimes it feels only Sabine is talking the actual science beyond the hypes 💫
Then she mentions the hype-loop, which is one of the biggest vaporware scams of the last 10 years, and ongoing.
@@ernestosiguenza629 Why is it a vaporware scam?
@@emperorpicard4901 this has been debunked to death, there are several issues that make it impractical. th-cam.com/video/CQJgFh_e01g/w-d-xo.html
Very true. She's very grounded, even within the physics community.
@@emperorpicard4901 Because, shortly speaking, Madgeburg Spheres and high-school physics. Thunderf00t, Common Sense Sceptic and host of other had done pieces on this and more reputable engineering channels didn't even touch it with 10meter rod.
10:23 i was laughing exactly as Sabine did when i saw this clip.
Hyperinteresting video by the way!
Happy you like it!
@@SabineHossenfelder before you hype the euhm hyperloop please consider this: a very long vacuum tunnel, a pod somewhere down that tunnel, an accidental rupture, and you become an uncontrollable projectile...
Hitting pause and studying the slide is golden btw. it's so bonkus, just random stuff in there, then put a random Faymanm diagram, some circle with electron and positron. Its completly bullshit, yet so "inspirational talking", TED at it's worst...
@@georgelionon9050 "Designed" for marketing purposes?
@@SabineHossenfelder That wasn't a laugh, it was an honest to god, girly giggle. :).
This was an information blast! 15.49 minutes of pure delight and information that you cannot get so succinctly anywhere else. Thanks.
11:13 Damn, Sabine fell in the Hyperloop trap? I am saddened.
It is quite amazing, that Sabine actually got to such detailed sources about this topic.
It is extremely hard to get reliable data in a reasonable time. I imagine that if I would want to gather reliable knowledge on this topic, I would have to spend around a month on full time studying various articles.
As handy as google is, having a good network of fellow scientists you can email and call is better.
a solid engineering or even school background makes you realise that hypersonic weapons are essentially bullshit.
Umm what about the Chinese or Russians ha f'n ha
That's precisely what amazes me, I wonder about the team's workflow behind this channel!
Longer.
Honestly, her research on this topic is very cursory and superficial. You could match her research in a month, yeah, but you (and her) wouldn't really fully understand it in a month ;)
Which isn't a slight against you, or her. There's just a lot _to_ know. Her video is a very "101" level understanding of the subject matter.
I'd give her video an A+, but at the end she tries to draw some conclusions, and her research is no where near that. The vid is kind of an oversimplification.
Best and most succinct summary of hyper-sonic missiles I have seen. I hate it when threats are overblown and the media eats up and pushes the false narrative.
Sabine, very illuminating on the pros and cons of the hypersonic vs ballistic missiles.
I like your reaction on that guy's push on antimatter power. How can he not know the amount of energy and cost to make and keep a tiny amount of antimatter is beyond reach. I suspect he got the idea from Dan Brown's Angels and Demons.
Good point! That may well be where he got the idea from. Some people seem to think the movies of Dan Brown's books are documentaries.
I designed and built a prototype fuel tank for anti matter, but I seem to have misplaced it.
@@tnekkc OOPS!
The idea of hypersonic glide vehicles is that they can maneuver at lower altitudes at hypersonic speeds. Rockets cannot do this. They do produce a lot of infrared but there is a lot of latency between space based infrared satellites and ground based interceptor missiles so its useless for targeting.
@@tomx641 Also it's near impossible for something going that fast to chance direction. ICBMs can't hit a moving target. I read that the top speed of carriers is classified. Plus, even if you could, you would need an extensive and vulnerable "Kill chain." There's a reason the U.S. didn't sign the space treaty and has ramped up Space Force. I mean, if something happened to the Russian and Chinese navigation satellites...what a shame.
"Optimized ballistic" reintroduces the predictability of the flight path. That it might be slightly faster than a standard ballistic missile almost doesn't matter at this point as the ability to intercept even faster targets on predictable flight paths (satellites) has already been demonstrated. In the Burnt Frost test a US Navy cruiser shot down a satellite in orbit. The MIT paper seems to deliberately mislead. Nobody is interested in hypersonics because they're faster than existing ballistic missiles. They're interested in hypersonics because they're faster than existing CRUISE missiles and less predictable than BALLISTIC missiles. The Russian Kinzhal missile is nothing more than an air-launched semi-ballistic missile. It uses solid rocket motors, and can do a bit of maneuvering, but it can't maneuver to the degree a boost-glider or cruise missile can. But it CAN get from point A to point B very quickly and is more difficult to shoot down than a subsonic cruise missile. And, because it's basically an Iskander battlefield missile modified for air-launch, it was something that could be cobbled together relatively quickly.
None of this is new stuff. ICBMs were virtually impossible to shoot down without using nuclear warheads on the defensive missiles, and they were a LOT easier to do and cheaper than atmospheric hypersonic weapons, so this made them the weapon of choice for over half a century. The US, with THAAD, SM-3 and GBI demonstrated long range ballistic missiles can reliably be shot down now without resorting to nuclear-armed defensive weapons, thus the scramble by China and Russia to methods other than ballistic missiles. The US is jumping on the bandwagon because eventually Russia and China will be able to shoot down ICBMs as well.
Back in 1980 the USAF flew the ASALM cruise missile faster than the X-51 (reaching Mach 5.5). In the 60s the US flew a maneuvering hypersonic boost glider (BGRV) at Mach 10+ for thousands of miles in the atmosphere. Neither were produced. Other methods were "good enough" at the time and cheaper.
Does anybody remember the Boeing SST (Super Sonic Transport) from the late 1960s?
I was friends with an engineer, name Jim Hutton, who worked on that thing before it was canceled.
He later gained minor fame as the designer of the overwing emergency escape hatch of the Boeing 737.
They were named after him. The next time that you are a passenger on a 737 and the stewardess points out the emergency escape hatches, note that they are called the Hutton Hatches.
No, never heard of it. How interesting!
I remember sonic booms when I was a kid. Happened fairly frequently. Broken windows were the biggest complaint not necessarily the boom itself.
i would imagine frequant kid complaints are very much current and more severe in our kid friendly missile ridden eastern europeen general life now. i think the broken window is more reasurring then annoying, i mean if you're thinkinging of broken stuff pretty good indicator you're not military grade broken lol
When Obama was President, he came to Washington state. A Cessna pilot made the unfortunate decision to fly into closed airspace and jets were scrambled from McCord AFB. They wasted no time--going supersonic and creating four very loud sonic booms. People in my neighboorhood were freaking out, thinking there was some sort of terrorist attack. I tried to console them to no avail.
About hypersonic missiles, these are being designed to be medium to short-range, possibly submarine mounted. So, you are looking at potential submarine or ship-based nuclear weapons that would leave very minimal reaction time. These are not to replace bunker based ballistic missiles, but to increase the threat factor of preemptive strike
Thanks Sabine for bringing some common sense to these subjects!
Yeah, she's like fresh air breath when you look at what is going on. People are insane. Climate change, Covid, Nuclear Fusion, AI optimists, etc. Science is dead. Common insanese. The funniest part is that in the most cases that was enough to be graduated in a regular school in order to stay resistant to all that pseudo "science - data based" bull shit.
Sabine, I would like to comment on your statement that in an evacuated tube high speeds are dramatically easier to achieve, in theory yes, but a major under-exposed issue is safety. The risk for an accidental cabin-decompression in the fragile pod moving at bullet speed in a near vacuum close to a heavy structure (tube) is far from negligible.
Surviving cabin-decompression even with an oxigen mask at hand is not possible below a certain pressure (0.2 Bar?). U2-pilots needed to wear a space-suit for this very reason. When one would keep 20% pressure in the tube for safety, the air-drag (energy use) becomes equal or worse than that of an ordinary airplane cruising at altitude.
And just think about what happens, if you try to drive a curve. You would be pressed against the wall and smeared as bloody pulp all over the inside of the cabin.
Oh you can take turns for sure. At about 1 degree / kilometre probably :D
Even before you get to the safety concerns though... there's the costs and the maintenance, and the tech.
1. So do we build a tube over land? How big? Materials also stretch in heat and fall victim to the elements... Hmmm. Or how about underground? Less elements to worry about. Maybe easier to regular temperature... Costs hundreds of millions to dig just hundreds of metres for a small tunnel and takes a looong time (Especially if you're the Boring Company). Then you've got the task of maintaining it... Not going to like that.
2. The tech? To create a vacuum good enough for supersonic and hypersonic travel. We're going to need a LOT of compressors. And they're going to have to be able to move about 200x more air than current best models... and run at about 1 thousandth of the power to be in constant use (yep... constant) without driving the costs way above interplanetary travel. Oh yeah and they have to be able to cycle airlocks in less than an hour (ha! good luck!) and you also need to be able to seal, compress, decompress etc. sections of tube/tunnel in the event of emergencies.
In summary: Hyperloop is NEVER happening. :D
@@Unethical.FandubsGames yeah, honestly, why do so many people want hyperloop type projects when light rail is so much cheaper and more reliable?
@@Unethical.FandubsGames I was about to give in to your argument, up to the last line.
"In summary: Hyperloop is NEVER happening. :D"
Because it just sounds like one of those smug statements just before big leaps in science.
640KB will be more than enough for everyone.
God does not play dice.
Not within a thousand years would man ever fly.
If light were shone on a circular obstruction, a bright spot would appear in the centre of the shadow, as bright as if the obstruction were not there at all. Obvious nonsense!
Big scientific leaps are highly correlated with high public opinion polarization. So, statistically, I should bet my money on hyperloops. Unfortunately, I am also aware that important conditions are different, whether significantly, that's left for the future to reveal.
Maybe your smug statement is not as catchy as the others and that's why we won't have hyperloops.
Change that one flaw: "the fragile pod". Humanity will progress and build safety into our feats.
it's refreshing to find a channel that's not over the top but entertaining
You make a good case against hypersonic ICBMs having shorter travel times than ballistic ICBMs but I have heard some other TH-camrs like Millenium 7* make some other points in favor of hypersonic weapons, particularly for anti-ship missiles. First, at hypersonic speeds the missile has so much kinetic energy that even if the explosives failed to detonate a ship would take serious damage. Second, even small amounts of maneuverability or the ability to maintain a low altitude would make it impossible to predict a weapon's target, making it much harder to intercept or defend against. Third, a hypersonic missile moves fast enough that current missile defense technologies (ones which rely on shooting down the missile with a smaller missile) may not be able to destroy them even if they detect the incoming threat.
Full of "ifs" and "mays" does not add up to a credible threat.
Watched it when it came out - rewatched it today. I hope the part about hypersonic missiles is still going to age well.
Dziękujemy.
You are an amazing teacher. Quite a leap from particle physics and cosmology to Newtonian physics! This video is extremely informative. As usual, you have shot down the military’s hypersonic missile.😊
“Mahk” -real German diction.
We've had long discussions about whether to use the German pronunciation or the Anglicized one!
@@SabineHossenfelder Oh but your German pronunciation is more sex ... I meant scientific.
@@KeithCooper-Albuquerque semantically accurate? XD
You should watch the news all August. First please pray for Ning Li "The Mother of NASA's First EM Compression / Gravity Modification Drive" has passed away last week in Huntsville where she conducted secret warp drive research for DoD Black Projects! She deserved a Nobel Prize in Physics for work in creating the first working "Gravity Modification Drive". But due to secrecy the Pentagon SCREWED HER OUT OF THE NOBEL PRIZE!
A concerned group of concerned vets have the tape of the century and the world is about to change forever. Complete analysis of the first video recording combat between US forces in Afghanistan and China's elite EM Compression Drive / "Artificial Gravity" Drone Force! There are 4 UAPs in the video which are unstoppable. They repel bullets and hellfire missiles.
Part of this video has been released already. The boys at the Pentagon have NO CHANCE STOPPING THIS LEAK > SORRY BOYS! IT IS OVER NOW !
The first half of video released video shows 2 drones surviving a direct hit from a Hellfire missile attack attack by an A10! Like we just spit at it!
The second part left off the first release (the edited part) shows Chinese Drones after surviving the hellfire attack leave the scene and COME BACK 2 minutes later and ON VIDEO they seemingly FCKING TELEPORT across the sky, but it is really just moving so fast the video frame rate can only catch the start and end point, not the actual move. We have confirmed the 80,000 feet in one second deal!
These damn superconductor drives are amazing! The entire video is to be release the VET GROUP is having UAP experts do forensics to determine the operating specs on the drone.
MAKE NO MISTAKE. THIS VIDEO IS SO GOOD YOU CAN SEE EXACTLY HOW THE EM COMPRESSION DRIVE WORKS! There are propulsion plumes but theey are wrapped in vortexing EM fields so you need to know what u r looking at! Hence the "experts" helping with forensics!
They are based on Ning Li's drive and in 5 years 10 companies will be mass producing these for transportation!
We are releasing the operational workings of all Skunkworks ad Chinese "Gravity Modification Drive"
We are now in the world of functioning EM Drives / Artificial Gravity Drives!
My father literally was in the firing room for Apollo 11 and personally knew Wernher von Braun and they ALL KNEW AT NASA the EM field caused gravity PERIOD! They established QKD Theory that describes the world with EM dipoles not magic! Space Time is not real but EM Compression Drives ARE VERY REAL!
Gravity is caused by collisions of actual electromagnetic kinetic dipoles and spacetime is joke to keep the public from building WARP DRIVES which is basically what is inside these chinses drones. 50g's 20,000 mph in atmosphere and 100000 meters a second in deep space space!
Just like DoD's Black Triangles have 3 glowing EM Compression "thrusters", these Chinese sub and truck launched drones use EM Compression Drives that use Microwaves the natural frequency of the EM Field Dipoles!
The glowing hot gas around the drones is caused by the ~~75MHz EM Field RF Microwave "force field" heating the local atmosphere! The superconductor generated EM Field around these drones 2000 X times stronger than an MRI!
Ever watcha fire extinguisher fly across a room into an MRI. Imagine that times 2000! But its a drone and you are carrying your own super magnet!
The HIGH TESLA MICROWAVE RF also scrambles electronics of a our missiles. It' like sticking a guidance computer in a microwave oven and expect it to still work.
I have seen an A-10 launched hellfire missile get disabled 20 feet from impacting the first drone and literally BOUNCE OFF the EM FORCE FIELD then it bounced of the second drone force field 20 feet away never touching the drone but the missiles course was altered 30 degrees in 100 feet by the intense EM GENERATED GRAVITATIONAL FIELD AROUNBD THE DRONE! Then it hits an afghan mountain ground unexploded. Drone didn't move at all!
The Pentagon is scared and thus silent because they lost this EM Compression / Gravity Modification War! China Wins This Round! Taiwan is what they are after and will stop at nothing to take it. Even if they have to build 10000 warp drive drones to go it!
This will happen quick because the Black Project contractors already know we have the video because they have been trying to hack our PCs ALL FCKN WEEK!
By months end. You will pray I was WRONG!
@@johnboze OMG! WTF? YOU POSTED A WALL OF TEXT ABOUT THIS AMAZING VIDEO AND NOT A SINGLE LINK. STOP TEASING.
I WAS MOST INTRIGUED BY THIS "EM GENERATED GRAVITATIONAL FIELD". SOUNDS LIKE SOMETHING FROM SCIENCE [PULP] FICTION.
Sabine is again, as usual, an island of calm reason in this increasingly hysterical world.
Honestly, that unnerves me a bit.
Part of the weapons equation of a low flying hypersonic missile includes kinetic impact - a relatively small weapon, far smaller than an ICBM, could demolish say and nuclear powered aircraft carrier or any land based targets. Russia's hypersonic missiles deployed now are on warships - at least those are the ones we know about.
Hi SH, 2 thing with hyper missiles. 1) They can change direction, It's much easier to change direction in a slow moving car, at high speeds direction changes take much longer and the direction change is much slower, this would be the same for hyper speed vehicles. 2) Flying at low altitude, the air pressure close to sea level would create huge resistance and thus temperature, most likely a plasma around the structure, this would surely affect the missiles aiming and tracking equipment. Your thoughts on this please.
Yes, I always find discussion of the danger of hypersonic missiles a bit odd. It's hard enough to get a missile to go in a straight line without melting. Getting it to turn at those speeds without disintegrating is a completely different problem.
@@jeromedavies2408 The point of hypersonics is covering as much middle ground as fast as possible for naval use. A conventional missile will need some kind of assisted guidance from an aircraft to keep up to date information on target position or else the ship might completely flee outside of on board sensor ranges. This means that carrier groups could deploy their own aircraft to destroy the targeting aircraft or just pressure them into fleeing. Satellite only gives you a few minutes of coverage above the target.
Launching a hypersonic allows the missile to get close enough to the ship to turn on its own sensors and slow down to conventional supersonic for terminal phase maneuvering.
if your target's route is unknown or hard to predict or it changes it's route, your interceptor needs to change path, and that means you need more kinetic energy in order to intercept, if the target is maneuverable enough (in other words it has enough kinetic energy), it can outperform the interceptor missile.
Programs have periodically been launched on this subject, starting with Reagan's Orient Express. The inadequacies of current materials are always the stumbling block, and - boom - big budget materials development efforts are launched. Materials engineers are assigned the impossible duty, and they try not to laugh. I was put in charge of Task 0 for one such program, a task meant to rationalize what was proposed to what is actually plausible. I vividly recall giving the conclusions at a very large meeting at NASA. Most of the proposed materials could be immediately dismissed with a 30-second calculation. They were only good as what I called "chart" materials, used to get funding or other for shenanigans.
That was 30 years ago, and I'm talking only of supersonic speeds. I also worked on more secret hypersonic programs, where the only approach to the worst stagnation areas (leading edges) was using copper cooled by slush hydrogen. As you suggest, the way to go is to remove yourself from the air problem. Or even better, just stay home.
That only works with ICBMs. Nearer the surface... you have air to deal with. As for 30 year old tech... of course it didn't work. As for the concept being flawed, it depends on where you set you goal line. A Mach 5-6 air breather with a 250 mile range in a package the size of a Tomahawk cruise missile might well be plausible and create a nightmare scenario for a carrier fleet at see launched from a bomber wing. B-1 lancer can launch 22 cruise missiles. 8 B-1s could launch 172 in a swarm attack against a carrier fleet without ever comming within range of the fighter CAP.
Rockets travelling at this speed Don't have that range. SCRAM jets do.
That is the combat envelope where they are dangerous, not as a poor man's ICBM.
She talks for many minutes on theory, then botches the proposed application rendering the entire argument pointless.
I could use the same logic to prove that the internal combustion engine couldn't possibly work by not including the concept of the timing belt.
Sorry. A pristine example of Junk Science.
Get the calculations right then botch the application with one of the final sentences.... then arrive at a false conclusion. This is a standard fallacy used in logical arguments. Its also called "Razzle Dazzle" in the movie "Chicago".
Its called B.S. most other places.
@@avgjoe5969 Let me think - have there been any significant jumps in structural materials over the past 30 years? No - and this was my sandbox, with PhD, doing R&D at a major aircraft engine company. Yes, some new stuff (see GE9X - CMCs come closest, and it appears they're using something for the first time from a project I led 30 years ago), but nowhere near the jump required for hypersonics. We need new elements for a big jump.
@@curtaustin8119 For hypersonics in the mach 10-12 range? I agree. However, there are a number of changes that have been made in cooling tech - the Skylon engine, the tests with hypersonic missiles done by the US and others. Consider Iconel and rocket bells that Spacex is using now at 330 bar with their Raptor engines. This does not even touch on the area of ceramics. So Yes, I think a sustained, long range, Mach 5-7 is definitely doable (my area was Metallurgical Engineering). Please be more specific in what speed range you refer to when you claim "it can't be done". The term "Hypersonic" straddles a very broad range.
Keep in mind that the AIM-54 Phoenix had a rated speed of mach 5 sustained over 100 mile range... in the 1970s. Nor did it employ cryogenic bleed gasses to cool it... so pardon me if I choose to hotly disagree.
The objective is to cut down the time a defensive system has to respond. A 5-7x reduction is quite good. You don't need a 10x reduction to be successful. Especially in a swarm-attack scenario.
The objective is to saturate the defenses.
@@avgjoe5969 The video focusses on transport, not missiles, and that's the context of my remarks. I can easily consider Inconel - I worked in Inco's research lab after getting a PhD in metallurgy. I later worked for an aircraft engine manufacturer on various high temperature alloys, including those that go by the lofty term 'superalloy', deservedly. I once revisited the potential of refractory alloys with much higher melting points (Nb/Cb, mostly); good for short term use as rocket nozzles in a fuel-rich environment, but oxidation resistance is very poor. Yes, it's possible to wave your arms about protective coatings and that sort of thing, and persuade funding agencies to give you money. Neither a pessimist nor optimist, I did push a 'high flyer' sort of material where I saw hope - supposedly it is just now being introduced, 30 years later, enabled by 3D printing. I have an engine tested airfoil right here on my desk as a memento. Just trying to establish some credibility here.
Oh- something to 'pin' the situation: One of the high operational expenses of the Concorde was that the turbine disks of the engines had to be replaced frequently - they got hotter than they'd like, and they weren't cheap. They pretty much last forever in subsonic engines, though they get pushed hard. This is in the context of transport aircraft, not military fighters.
10:10 I love the subtitle "HAHAHA"
Seems like everything that starts with a "Hyper" is actually a Hype-Er.
_Hypericum_ is a very nice genus of flowers with many pretty species, though St John's Wort has been over-hyped for use against depression.
Only Samuel Taylor Coleridge ever had a hyperclimax.
That's certainly true of "Hyper Loop".
Anyone who doesn't realize it's a scam to remove high-speed rail funding hasn't looked through the physics of it.
Except when it's nano. Next thing we know we get hypernano...
Get with the times. Hyper has been replaced with "Elon".
I think I’ve said it before. But for me it’s very important we have people like you who dares to say what almost no one says. So this honest approach shakes apparently some physics ( I’ve seen it) but I think it’s good because it’s so easy to get carried away. Pure respect for doing this
Yes I agree with you, still I think she showed some naivete, not covering anything Chinese or Russians, as their at the front of this technology, and it's looking like the US doesn't want it known.
I think you have a little misconception about hypersonic missiles. They're not a replacement for ICBMs.
Think of hypersonic missiles more like harder to intercept (cruise) missiles with a range of ~ 100-500 NM. Something like a BGM-109 or a AGM-84, but harder to intercept. Especially on terminal run for impact, where todays missiles can be intercepted with defense weapons like a RIM-116 or even a Phalanx.
wow, to think that of all the videos i've watched, THIS channel would be the one to simplify what RamJet and ScramJet differences are in a way thats easy to remember. Thanks.
Intelligence meets style! These videos are informative, well executed and a joy to watch. Thanks 🙏
10:36-10:39 We have a clip of Sabine laughing!
SH can make any topic interesting. She is the science teacher we all wish we had.
Thank you Sabine. The analysis you made is really nice one, and account for some lesser known (and by some intentionally omitted) aspects. I noticed in one point that you mentioned the low pressure tube as a mode of transport. I wonder will you be interested in researching the hyperloop?
As a former Aerospace and ballistic missile defense engineer I enjoy seeing some sense on hyper-sonic weapons.
They have another problem which Sabine did not address, guidance. A hyper sonic device in air is totally isolated,. No radio communication can get through the plasma around it and no window material exists to enable imaging for guidance. Ballistic missiles have little problem with this thanks to lot of development of inertial guidance and a long mid course phase in space, in which they can get navigation updates up to re-entry. This is not trivial except when compared to the problem of guiding an endo atmospheric weapon.
An endo-atmospheric hyper-sonic weapon has a severe accuracy problem. That is not an issue for terrorizing a civilian population, those nukes do not have to very accurate but to hit the retaliatory sites does requires great accuracy.
In short strategic hyper-sonics do not change the nuclear balance and guidance is another reason.
Smaller tactical hyper-sonics make sense as the impact energy is huge. Anti armor tank fired rounds are near hyper-sonic.
Another device which has been consider, and may be worth a podcast is "The Rod of G-D", This is long rod dropped from orbit as mentioned Neal Stephenson's book "Anathem"
Sabine! Thanks so much for this discussion. Especially about hypersonic missiles. China’s recent testing of a hypersonic missile got heavy play on US media when our General Chief of Military Staff told Congress in a hearing that China’s test of a hypersonic missile isn’t quite a Sputnik moment, but comes close and is worth close scrutiny. Considering the real and present dangers to public health and economy posed by climate change, the info you shared helps cut through the normal hyperbole so we don’t get too wrapped around the axle by the self-sustaining narrative of, what Eisenhower called, the military industrial complex.
Ted Talks are always out there. They even let Solar Roadways talk. The antimatter bit was hilarious. It costs trillions per gram and we’ve never created and safely stored more than a few positrons. Thanks for the enlightening video. Love your vids. ❤️
More on thermodynamics please. I’m obsessed with entropy and the arrow of time.
solar fucking roadway
Ah, good old solar roadways. Always good for a chuckle.
That was a very clear and well-presented video on a poorly-understood subject! Thank you Sabine for your clarity.
Very interesting! But I need to comment one point
15:00 While earth being round is beyond discussion :), early warning radars are not really limited by earth's curvature. It would be quite useless and pathetic to have an "early" radar warning limited by horizon. Long range radars have range of hundreds or thousands km, using ionosphere as sort of waveguide, bending propagating radio wave with earth's curvature.
I'm curious, what then is the reason that radar cannot detect objects flying very low? Or, is that a myth? Or, maybe just outdated?
@@GP-qz6kk Good point! Thing is tad complicated. Problem is long range radars are rather imprecise. Sure, they give warning that something is coming, but not much beyond that. On top of that, if the target is flying sufficiently low, target echo tends to get covered by earth clutter echo (hills, buildings, forests, etc). So, yeah, flying low helps.
High frequency (short waves) have better chance to detect low flying targets, but these are indeed limited by radio horizon (so they are short range).
Radio horizon depends mostly on antenna height (higher antenna = higher radio horizon). Hence army introduced AWACS, big planes with powerful, short wave radars. Since they fly high in sky their radio horizon is significantly improved and since they use relatively short waves, they have big chance to detect even low flying target.
@@robertbloch1063 Interesting. Thanks!
@@GP-qz6kk The reason is Earth horizon and fundamental physics. Unless you use over-the-horizon radars which bring in inherent wavelength limitations (you have to bounce them from ionosphere) - OTH radars works in tens of MHz frequency, while typical radars use GHz. This in turn relates to precision, cross-section and dimensions of targets that can be discerned and power budget. Some OTH radars are australian JORN or French th-cam.com/video/UDnPS6U5JX4/w-d-xo.html
Interesting as in a previous life I was a radar operator on the artic circle. I was stationed at several stations One at Bartar Island , Katovic
we would send inteceptors, that was then and this is now the speeds have increased incredably. I love your subjects and I am always interested and love your interpetation and ability to explain in terms such as I can understand, Thank You and keep up the good work...
10:37 - I replayed your giggle more than 47 times. And came to the conclusion that I liked it a lot 😉👍🏻
That aside, "The earth is round" made me giggle.
note the subtle zoom in and out
Yeah, that must have been for the flat Earth crowd. 😁
Debunking engineering stuff with a sharp scientific eye is great, I want more !!
There are too many people talking nonsense about futuristic technologies, and rarer persons such as you that can temper the expectations with a rational thinking. So keep on and thanks for that !!
And yet she thinks the hyperloop is a good idea. It's embarrassing to be honest.
An easier way for people to understand stagnation temperature, is that it's essentially just "compression". It's not even _really_ drag as you'd normally think of drag, and not really friction exactly either. It's that the wedge at the front of the vehicle is compressing the air it's pushing aside. And at supersonic speeds, and especially hypersonic speeds, that compression can get very intense. And of course when you compress gas, it releases heat, decompress it, it absorbs heat.
Long pointy noses alleviate this considerably, shoving air aside more gradually (less compression). But the nose isn't razor sharp, so there is a thin layer of air releasing a lot of heat. Air which was hit by the blunt tip (however small), and shoved aside at supersonic speed. As it passes over the airframe, it mingles with cooler less compressed air, and isn't so intense. Thus the heat being so concentrated at the leading edges, even if the angle of the wedge shapes looks the same further back.
Technically every leading and trailing edge surface generates a sonic boom, not just the nose and tail. This makes supersonic aerodynamics 'Complicated'(tm).
When you get up over mach 5 or 6, then you run into a bigger problem. Then it's not just the air hitting the leading edge which is shoved aside at supersonic speed, but the air hitting the entirety of any frontal wedge-shapes. Basically the supersonic shockwave is pushed up against the skin of the leading edges, well back from the very tip. This is some thoroughly violently compressed air, and it's pushed against the frontal areas (not just the tip) like a vice is holding it there. So instead of a little bit of supersonically compressed crazy-hot air tricking back from the very tip, and dissipating heat, it's the whole frontal area creating this effect. Heat levels are suuuper high.
The SR-72 prototype has a shape which allows it to go up to mach 6, before the supersonic shockwave is butting directly against the skin of aircraft. If it exceeded that speed, and the supersonic shockwave ended up in contact with the skin of the aircraft (beyond just the tip) it would melt & burn up very rapidly.
The reason for the 'squishy' definition of how fast is hypersonic, is because it depends on the edge angles on the front of the vehicle.
Missiles or reentry vehicles (anything which is 'single-use') can cheat this problem, by simply being disposable, and doin their job quickly, before they entirely melt. Just give them a thick skin, and design them around finishing their job before they fall apart. Space shuttle is a rare exception, where it's tiles allow it to just absorb and endure the heat, for enough seconds to perform reentry, and then dissipate it after. Although a space shuttle is too hot on the outside to approach for hours after landing. The astronauts would stay inside for a while, so they're safe from the skin of the shuttle. Anyway, the issue of speed with the space shuttle was not going into orbit (which you describe accurately as leaving the atmosphere before getting too fast), but reentry, where it _does_ fly in atmosphere at mach 25. But it rapidly decelerates.
During the "space plane" R&D, it was very important that such a craft get into orbit quickly. Because heat tiles can only absorb the heat for a very limited time without saturating and melting down the interior like a plane-shaped crucible. It didn't just have to be able to get to orbit, but do so rapidly. Quite an engineering problem really.
A mach 8 passenger aircraft, which wants to go to mach 8 and sit there for 30 minutes, is frankly absurd.
As for the threat of hypersonic missiles. The concern is for 2 types of devices:
- hypersonic cruise missiles, which fly at high mach (5-8, maybe 10) inside the atmosphere, and travel to their target too rapidly to be easily engaged by missile defenses (particularly ship based missile defenses). This can be compensated for to a large extent, because the turning potential at that speed is abysmal, so defenses can lead the target considerably. But it does require defenses to act far too rapidly to double or triple check exactly what it is they're shooting at. Making tragic mistakes quite likely.
- hypersonic glide vehicles, which while slightly slower than regular reentry vehicles, do require more complex anti-balistic missile systems to engage, because they do change path. Also, they could be used to obfuscate their point of origin, or use less obvious flight paths to go around defensive systems. Something like this could be used to go around a defensive network. Or even to spoof attacks so as to make them appear to come from uninvolved nations. This is very unhelpful to world peace.
It is somewhat overhyped though, yes. At least as far as military targets are concerned. Mostly hypersonic weapons endanger civilian aircraft, and uninvolved nations. They're not _overtly_ more dangerous to their targets, given appropriate tweaks are made to defensive systems.
What is FAR more destabilizing and problematic for world peace, is an orbital bombardment system. Which unfortunately China recently tested. Also Russia's nuclear super torpedo... it's much harder to defend against. But more importantly, it makes identifying the attacking party very difficult. For now, the use of such a device would obviously be by Russia. But if anyone else develops a similar device, then you have the potential for WWIII mixed with a guessing game about which country is attacking. Which is actually (remarkably) more problematic than just a regular WWIII.
To be fair, the US stealth bomber raises some of the same concerns. While the very high risk of the cold war may be over, we're entering a technological phase where there's greatly increased risk simply because of the possibility of temptation by a bad actor, to think they might be able to use nuclear weapons without being the one to be blamed for it (or retaliated against). Whether they are correct or not, that temptation is no bueno.
Thank you for this video, it contains a lot of useful information. However, I think dismissing the hypersonic threat on account of these weapons' IR signature is a bit cavalier. Being able to detect something and being able to get a lock on it with a system that can actually destroy it are two VERY different things. Here, you would need to have a network of satellites with IR sensors covering all of your territory 24/7, and you'd need them to be able to transmit targeting data to anti-missile missiles in real-time, allowing them to get close enough to incoming hypersonic missiles to eventually get a lock thanks to their own IR sensors, while adapting to any evasive maneuvers the incoming hypersonic missile might perform, both before and after getting within line-of-sight of it.
As far as I know, the defensive systems required to do this simply do not exist at this time. Perhaps they could be developed, and perhaps they would work reasonably well, but everything about this is harder than intercepting ballistic missiles, which is already very hard: you have to work with a distributed system and only rely on the anti-missile missile's IR sensor once you're within line of sight, you have to worry (more) about the atmosphere, and you have to account for unpredictable trajectories.
So basically, hypersonic systems make an already very difficult interception task even harder.
The accuracy of being able to target a hypersonic missile might be improved if instead of anti missile missiles lasers were used from satellites so as to strike the missiles outside the atmosphere. To be more certain of hitting the target, instead of a straight beam of energy have the beam scan around in a circular arc of the predicted area the missile should be. Since the laser energy would be traveling at the speed of light there would be only a little bit of difference from firing of the laser to where the missile would be but scanning from a point just ahead of prediction in a circular motion would likely strike it. Keeping the laser focused on the missile after the first laser strike might be a problem but more scans and heating of the missile from the strike could be detected by infrared sensors, to predict the path of the missile and enable further more strikes continuously until the missile was totally destroyed.
@@grgmetube Yes, but powerful lasers are hard to make, especially in space, and weather conditions can complicate things quite a bit. And you'd need a lot of these satellites to protect your airspace. It might be doable, but it's certainly not easy.
@@Lexoka If you use lasers in space there is no atmosphere or very minute amount to produce weather problems. The idea is to destroy the missiles while they are outside the atmosphere, part of there trajectory.. The enrgy could come from solar to power the lasers. They would only be using energy while they shooting which would be a small amount of time compared to the time building up enough charge from solar enrgy. The voltage could be built up from capacitors and diode chains. Although some quite large high farad capacitors would be needed. There might be better ways to utilize the solar energy for lasers that I am unaware.
As always, excellent. Thank you.
One small point because the seeming endless 'loop of hyperbole' makes me grumpy.
The concept of a hyperloop makes no engineering sense at all while being at very best right on the edge of what physics may allow.
Fantastic discussion, and I hope you're right.
Sabine--I follow aerospace developments very closely so I was interested to see how you would handle a topic out of your usual areas of expertise, but I could find no error in anything you said. Very, very impressive. (I am speaking as a fan!)
Then you must follow it with your head, somewhere the sun don't shine . Because she didn't have the Chinese and Russians as the focus of the video, America is along way back in the rankings, N Korea is probably further ahead. hehe. If the US had the technology, then Biden would of sold it to them anyway
Thanks Sabine!
This morning my various news feeds were filled with alarming headlines about China surprising the U.S. with a nuclear-capable hypersonic missile test. By coincidence (or perhaps not?) your video showed up in my TH-cam feed a few hours later. Thank you for putting this headline in proper perspective. You have a new subscriber!
I thought the danger of long range hypersonic weapons was the hypersonic maneuvering final flight stage to target which makes kinetic interceptions difficult.
The problem with maneuvering at the final flight stage is that hypersonic flight in atmosphere heats the air so much that it generates a layer of plasma. This layer of plasma hinders communication between the missile and the outside world, so the missile is effectively flying "blind". Interceptions will be difficult, but guiding the missile to a target will be difficult as well.
Do we have the capability to intercept MIRV in their rentre phase? I doubt so, what's the point the hypersonic missile are trying to improve?
@@rolletroll2338 I thought that was much less difficult, but I am not certain of the answer to your question.
I love when Sabine scoffs at hype and non-sense
"We have better things to worry about." --thank you, Sabine, you put it in perfect perspective.
Thank you, Sabine, I love what you're doing!
One little thing: 30' from US to Frankfurt? Simply put that means 11-12' of continuous acceleration and 11-12' of continuous deceleration during the flight. This for a lay person not for fighter pilot or a F1 pilot? Well, this guarantees a severe muscle fever (at least) at the neck muscles in the next days. I'll bet a normal passenger would not board that plane again! Ever! :)))
This really deserves more likes.
I was going to do the math (did you take in account the deceleration?), and point out that hypersonic speeds will probably never be feasible for passenger transportation. Plus, the seats would be able to turn backwards for deceleration. Never mind using on inboard bathroom.
@@loremipsum7ac When I studied Aerospace Engineering in the 90s, hypersonic transport was all the "hype". But once you see, how little acceleration a normal passenger is willing to endure for comfort reasons (1.1-1.2 g maximum for prolonged times) it becomes clear, that this is really not viable at all. This fact was pointed out by one of my professors back then, but seems to be conveniently forgotten, every time someone writes a research grant for this kind of transport...
Well, we apparently live in a world where otherwise (apparently) sane YT presenters casually discuss the idea of using Starship for point to point passenger travel, so I guess anything goes...
@@luggiduggi Interesting point. In fact, if you set (say) 1G as your maximum acceleration, that more or less defines the quickest possible time between any two points, no matter what technology is being proposed. Anything that can go faster than that, simply isn't going to be usable. And, I suspect, in reality the sustained acceleration most people would put up with for more than a few minutes would be a lot less than 1G. I remember thinking exactly this when I first saw the Hyperloop proposal - maximum speed isn't defined by the technology or fuels or whatever, it's limited by passenger comfort.
@@paulhaynes5029 Spot on! You know, what I want from Musk & Space Community is not a vehicle able to crawl 1+ years towards Mars (I couldn't care less about that ultra hyped topic) but to produce a space vehicle able to transport 4 people for regular service of Hubble Space Telescope and bring them home alive (this is a significant and mandatory demand!). This is because after all these years the good old HST still has life in it and also, the new and long time awaited James Webb Space Telescope has a close but different radiation range. Yeah, wishful thinking.
I really like the laugher at 10:36
2nd visit here, was affraid will be as confused as the first time but this I did understood. Yaay!
Well put together, checking the details step by step, loved it.
Thanks for the effort put into it, subbed.
Thank God for you Sabine. As an Air Force brat who grew up immersed in the idiotic cold war mentality, it is obscene and you are absolutely correct that we have better things to worry about. I'm so glad that, unlike many American engineers, a physicist such as yourself has not been dazzled by the supremely wasteful and unethical "defense" industries.
I was with you when you laughed out loud at the antimatter idea but then to suggest Hyperloop as something viable? As a physicist, I'm sure you're aware of the practical difficulties in maintaining even a soft vacuum with volumes such as the LHC. Let alone volumes required to provide feasible travel routes. Surely it makes much more sense to use extremely high altitudes instead? I was interested to see Virgin Galactic pull off a "zero G" parabolic flight well into the stratosphere. But rather than marvelling at the illusion of the passengers "escaping earth's gravity" as they apogeed "in space", I was much more intrigued by the possibility of plotting a trajectory optimised for distance, rather than altitude and freefall.
Are you aware that the wall strength required for a tunnel is really similar to that which would be required by a vacuum chamber?
@@davidwarford3087 I am not an engineer, but believe the hyperloop has no problems with material strength like a hypersonic aircraft does. We could easily build the vacuum chambers and the pods and they would theoretically be fine traveling even at very high speeds as you don't have the air problem.
The main deal-breaker problems for the hyperloop are maintaining the vacuum in the very large continuous chamber, an efficient way to put and remove pods into the system while maintaining the vacuum, and the catastrophic failure of the whole line in the event of an unintentional depressurization of the tube (at any point the air problem could be violently reintroduced into the system whether by negligence, accident, or malicious intent).
Sub-orbital space flight at hypersonic speeds is at least theoretically possible and I see no glaringly obvious reason why it couldn't even be practical. The main problems for it is most likely economics (and maybe environmentalism with its fuel usage XD), not physics or engineering.
@@imacds Well, consider your 'beliefs' to be considered heresy and start with watching Mythbusters pumping air out of wagon and and learning about Magdeburg spheres.
In fact, nothing is viable with current technology, vacuum trains like Hyperloop are actually one of the most realistic: technically possible but not economically. Putting people into ballistic missiles is another option, but the individual costs would be absurd, it could only work as a joyride for the ultra-rich. Even the much more accessible, technically proven supersonic flight is not economically viable so we stopped doing it.
@@gubx42 a TH-cam channel called Adam Something has a very good video on the impractibility of the hyperloop, mainly from a standpoint of logistics and city planning. He routinely criticises the ideas of Elon Musk, which is a breath of fresh air from the common internet perception of him as a god like figure
As always, a clear explanation. Thank you. I enjoyed the well deserved dry humor.
What's the meaning of "hypersonic" in space, where sound does not propagate in the vacuum?
It has little meaning, hypersonic is mach 5 and above and depends on sound speed which is dependent on the air your craft is in, no sound speed in space
It still means faster than mach 5 = 5 x 330 m/s. It doesn't matter that sound doesn't propagate there.
@@alwaysdisputin9930 : No. As Sabine explained, the speed mach N depends on the medium. Mach N is N times the speed that a sound propagates through the specified medium. But sound does not propagate through a vacuum, so the definition breaks down there.
I think I'd rather a bigger atom-smasher than faster missiles; maybe we should somehow convince the world's military powers that the Ultimate Weapon is in fact a massive particle-collider on the Moon.
Around the moon.
Perhaps an array of telescope on the moon! It will be easier to convence and is more promising.
@@jonathancamp7190 Also, so many people have being saying 'Mach' totally wrong, including me. One-up for Dr. H!
@@aniksamiurrahman6365 That is for the advancement of humanity.
I'm thinking of keeping the warmongers out of the way and distracted.
Maybe the telescopes on the outside whilst the particle collider is built inside, along the circumference.
@@CAThompson Passed!
BRAVO! Well done. Excellent construct of the storyline. Precise and Pleasing to listen too --- a nice/unique combination.
We had the Concorde already. There just wasn't enough demand for that level of speed at the fuel cost of that speed.
Well...yes and no. The concorde was a service aimed at the HYPER rich and where not interested in lowering the costs of the flight. The whole plane was in fact first class seats only. Modern cattle-ification of the traverlers would lower the costs per seat significantly. What we really need to think about righ tnow is: Do we really need to travel that fast?
The lack of demand was because of restricted routes. If you are thinking there aren’t enough people who would prefer to fly LA to NYC in two hours instead of six, then I would guess you’ve never taken that flight. And that’s the whole point of new super sonic research and design, to make the planes quiet enough to fly over populated areas. More routes means a greater supply, so the price will go down. That’s basic microeconomics.
I understood that maintenance was a key issue. Also, a plane would fly, say, London to NYC, then, instead of turning around and flying passengers the other way would sit on the ground for a day. That increases capital costs for a given number of flights. I understood that the two were related.
You see, problem is that even in mid-80s we already had vastly superior engines ( GE YF-120 ) to Rolls Royce Olympus mounted on Concorde. Enlarged concorde with 4 of them today could comfortably supercruise at say, Ma 1.6 without afterburner.
You should make another video about the hilarious designs of the hyperloops, as they have about the same likelihood to be used in any commercial sense as antimatter.
It sounds like she thinks they are a possibility since she suggested them as a viable alternative. Why anyone would think they are any more likely I don’t know.
I think she's using it more to refer to the physical concepts around the hyperloop rather than an endorsement of the engineering.
@@murph8411 Well they are a viable alternative. In the sense that both ideas are absolutely not viable. but are comparatively viable.
A year later and this information is even more relevant. Another great one, Sabine. Thank-you.
Great presentation. It’s so refreshing to see the public gain access to some real science instead of hype.
Arms lobbyist: SHOCK AND AWE!!!
Sabine: meh
The Sabine short giggle should be used more often when things that are completely batshit crazy don't need any further explanation! It's very effective at conveying the message!
The Sabine Giggle should absolutely be a meme, although now we are in the part of history where The Onion said they were going out of business because the real news was stupider than anything they could come up with, the Sabine Giggle would be heavily overused. Might need to limit it to Persons Foolish About Physics.
10:36 that's a very rare sighting of Sabine Hossenfelder laughing out loud
Yes. Good comedians and elegant people don't laugh at their own jokes.
Thank you Sabine for a concise and thorough presentation on the physics of hypersonic flight. As you pointed out the threat of these weapons is not necessarily a strategic one for the US military ... but you failed to point out the tactical implications of such a missile.
On July 19, 2021 a Russian 3M22 Tsirkon cruise missile was launched from a warship and travelled 350 KM @ mach 7 and hit a target. This test was the missiles final test before being declared fit for full deployment with the Russian navy and air force .... including submarines. You are correct that this weapon doesn't necessarily change the balance of power in regards to Russia's ability to strike the US mainland ... They've had that capability all along. It is however a deadly threat to the USA ability to project power via aircraft carriers ... the keystone to the USA's ability to fight wars outside their borders.
The Pentagon is very good at picking the pocket of the taxpayer ... this is why hypersonic weapons are sold as an existential threat to American taxpayers when the real threat is to the Pentagons ability to wage war anywhere in the world from 50,000 ft.
Sabine, against the hype you said that Russias hypersonic missiles are not really that special. And 1 1/2 years later those missiles failed hard in Ukraine and you were proven very right.
Well done. :)
Thank you! Fact based reasoning is beautiful.
Missing the point on hypersonic missiles, you're not looking at shorter distances, and that is what a lot of these missiles are being developed to do.
At a shorter distance the target as no time to react until it is gone.
Most of these hypersonic missiles are being developed for anti ship purposes.
Or other land based targets that have no defense against such a fast moving object.
Since this video only concerned itself with the military's delusions of what hypersonic missiles might be used for, the military is to blame for using long distances as a reason to get funding for their new toys. If they were to be used against relatively close targets, the military discourse certainly does not reflect that in any shape or form!
All the "military discourse" I've heard about hypersonic missiles has been exclusively related to anti-ship weapons, comparing them to subsonic cruise missiles.
The threat of anti-shipping weapons is very, very real, having been demonstrated repeatedly against military and civilian assets.
@@thatguy6054 Particle beams already being deployed can of course shoot down hypersonic conventional attacks. At near light speed Particle beam weapons are point and shoot. Conventional auto cannon already defending against supersonic jet missiles and artillery shells and probably can handle it as well. Ships might need to keep a radar plane up like they already do to insure the weapons pointed the right way.
missileexited
particularimposable
@@hakon_dlc Both the Russians in the Chinese have tested hypersonic missiles for anti-ship
purposes. Russia has actually done submarine launches, of these missiles.
The military discourse as you put it, certainly does show their concern because these missiles
as of this time have they have no way to be stopped there is no defense against them. The American navy, sees them as aircraft carrier killers.
@@RedRocket4000 You have been reading way too much science fiction.
The best we have are laser based weapons. And these are still being tested, and only a few ships have them.
Even these weapons have no chance to stop them if they are traveling short distances.
By the time they know it's coming it's already hit them.
Thanks for the info and clarifying the danger and hype.
*Excellent video:* The ability to get a reliable internet connection and a comfortable seat on a conventional, old-fashioned train would probably do far more to improve traveler's journeys than flying around the world in sealed metal tubes at crazy speeds than anything else.
you are so right...reminds me of the time they 'sped up' the lifts in the Empire State by installing mirrors in the foyer...they had identified the actual problem (complaints about waiting-times) and in a stroke of possibly accidental genius, went right to the real problem: the complaining...the mirrors distracted the users and the complaints stopped...in your scenario, the complaint would be around 'time taken', and the mirrors - the internet connection...
A good internet connection functions as a time machine. One's primary concern then becomes not missing your stop.
It would be interesting to compare the energy requirement for an optimized ballistic path vs. hypersonic for transportation.
Hmm.. I feel I have to correct this.
HGV's aren't really about speed, they're about defeating missile defence systems.
To do this HGV's use (speed obviously but also) innovative control surfaces to approach targets with odd trajectories that confuse conventional intercept systems.
HGV's are not for really attacking stationary targets but for defeating aircraft carriers etc.
HGV's spend the last 10 miles or so of their approach (which they travel in a matter of seconds) at very low altitude following a non-ballistic trajectory.
The only way the US could effectively engage China in conventional warfare is by Sea. HGV's effectively preclude this option. To quote someone clever :
"The good thing about HGV's is that they make conventional warfare almost impossible. The bad thing is that they make conventional warfare almost impossible"
HGVs do not approach the target at low altitudes. Going at hypersonic speeds at those altitudes for any significant period of time destroy missiles. It would also be pointless to only sea skim for the last 10 miles.
They are also still very counter-able, since they have very large IR and radar cross sections and approach at high altitudes, meaning that defense systems can engage them from very far away. Systems like AEGIS can deal with them, albeit they do require a decent expenditure of munitions to do so.
Generally the real reason behind adopting hypersonics is to compensate for inconsistent or short term ISR. If you can only reliably get targeting data from a LEO radar satellite or a soon-to be destroyed drone that will give you a few minutes worth of time to get a missile onto target, a hypersonic weapon will be able to get there before that targeting info “runs out”. In contrast, a military like the US, which can generally rely on having consistent targeting data through naval air power can use subsonic VLO munitions like the LRASM, which likely actually perform better than hypersonics in a ASM role.
Thanks Sabine, good to hear the facts based on physics and engineering realities, not silly "hyped up conjecture".
When I was studying physics in university I reached the class when they explained us the jet engine workings and I was beyond total amazement. It blew my mind literally.
Then the pure genius of the diffusion pump finished blowing the rest of what was left of my brains.
I was rocked by the simple concept of the 'compressor fan'
I was explained this - at a lower level, of course - in the Air Training Corp - amazing things...
I doubt that it literally blew your mind.
@@leisti I have no mind since then.
My mind got blown when my amazing teacher explained three phase ac theory. Power factors and all that.
Thank you for another immensely informative video, Sabine. You're the best!
Judging by the plaster on your knuckle you were in a fight. Judging by your face you won. I'm currently looking for a picture of a proponent of a new higher energy particle accelerator with a black eye.
You are very observant! Alas, I scratched my hand rather ungloriously pulling out my carry on item from an overhead compartment in a very subsonic airplane.
@@SabineHossenfelder & I was already scared that you tried to tear down the fourth wall. ^.^ , °{ I could almost hear the bang.
By the way ... great earrings! (8)}
@@SabineHossenfelder stop the deception please!!! We all know you stuck your hand out of the cockpit of the new Mach 7 fighter... 'overhead compartment', yeah, right. =)
Why waste Antimatter - once we can actually store significant amounts - on travel in the atmosphere? Traversing the Solar System in a matter of weeks would be much more interesting!
Even for point-to-point travel, you may as well just go suborbital with a spaceplane if you have that level of technology. Heat shielding wouldn't even be a concern because with that much energy available, you can just use some giant stupid electromagnets to keep those pesky plasma fronts off your hull.
For now, anti-matter is mainly an unbelievably costly way to store energy. It woukd take virtually infinite ressources to create enough antimatter to fly anything, and would demand luch more energy input than output.
The potential for space travel is indeed huge in a distant future, but to talk about going to New York with an antimatter jet is just laughable.
@@IZn0g0uDatAll yah right now I'm counting on fusion reactors to create light particles that leave the engine at a significant portion of c to shorten the travel time between Earth and the outer planets to a year or two possibly to happen in my lifetime...
@@nicolaiveliki1409 it’s quite impossible to predict what technology will look like tbh. I’m quite certain 1960 people would have been very surprised to learn we would still use chemical rockets in 2020.
If we look at general trends, those technologies have massively slowed down their progresses (compare 1900 and 1960 and 1960 and 2020). It might be that this trend will carry on and that we won’t find much better than what we have now for a while.
On the other hands, information technologies were completely impossible to predict 50 years ago. A smartphone would be white magic for a 1960 person. In Isaac Asimov novels, people 30 thousand years in the future use written documents and travel to other planets to visit libraries.
Anyway, all of that to say that making any kind of predictions is hazardous at best.
@@IZn0g0uDatAll fusion drives are in reach technologically. They don't even have to be economically efficient (because no cosmoaviation propulsion system really is) they just have to reach better specific impulse and the engine itself has to provide for more propulsion relative to its weight. I'm saying 'just' but it is a steep engineering hurdle, though we know it's possible in principle
Hi Sabine, you came into my YT feed and I'm so glad you did as I thoroughly enjoyed this vlog. I am not a scientist, just an ordinary layman interested in aeronautics and astronomy. You presented a complex topic in an informative manner with a bit of dry wit added for good measure! New subscriber here!!
!0:36 It's great to see you laugh! I had come to believe you never did... Awesome video! Just one observation people usually miss: The speed of sound depends on the square root of the temperature, so the higher you fly, the smaller it becomes. Thus, it isn't the same to measure Mach at sea level than at the higher altitudes these planes would fly. There's another issue: The higher you fly, the greater your exposure to cosmic rays becomes. Concorde had an alarm system to dive to a lower altitude if the cosmic rays were exceedingly strong due to some solar event.