"Chuck Stewart" wrote in message
news
On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 14:54:36 -0500, Jon Berndt wrote:

Nowhere is mention made that this particle beam causes any "equal and
opposite" action at the particle-beam source. If this near-Earth station
is
blasting a particle beam into space that causes a spaceship to
accelerate
(momentum transfer) to "tens of thousands" of mph ... what is the source
doing to maintain position or orbital velocity? Am I missing something?

Just handwave in electrodynamic tethers and you can devise a
truly Rube Goldbergian propulsion scheme.

Bob Forward has the same problem with his laser-propelled sail. His laser
array was orbiting Mercury in a plane perpendicular to the path of the
receding sail. When the lasers fired, the orbit was displaced slightly from
the plane cutting through the center of gravity of Mercury, but the array
continued orbiting and didn't leave.

See no reason one couldn't do the same from Earth.

--


Regards,
Mike Combs
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Member of the National Non-sequitur Society. We may not make
much sense, but we do like pizza.