May 8, 2009
NASA is running out of rocket propulsion fuel
Deep space probes beyond Jupiter can’t use solar power because they’re too far from the sun. So they rely on a certain type of plutonium, plutonium-238. It powers these spacecraft with the heat of its natural decay. But plutonium-238 isn’t found in nature; it’s a byproduct of nuclear weaponry.
The United States stopped making it about 20 years ago and NASA has been relying on the Russians. But now the Russian supply is running dry because they stopped making it, too.
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NASA is not running out of rocket fuel. They have run out of propulsion fuel.
Rockets can’t use slow nuclear decay to achieve orbit, for that they use quick chemical combustion. Once they get into space they use nuclear decay engines; there the force of friction is less than the force of the decay.
Jeez, get it straight! Didn’t you have to take Newtonian (i.e. Basic) physics in high school?
yes, good point.