ALL SCI-FI

[Pye-Rate]

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This is how movies get it wrong.


_Here's what would happen if you fired a gun in space
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The road to tomorrow runs through yesterday.

[Krel]

There was an episode of "Firefly", where to fire a rifle in space, they put it inside of a space suit. There was a big discussion over that. It is amazing how many people think that you need air to fire a firearm. I just couldn't convince some people that a cartridge is sealed and does not use air for combustion. Even supplying links to videos of firearms firing underwater didn't convince them.

David.

[Bud Brewster]

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David, I remember that episode well, the one where Jayne used his favorite rifle to fire at a spacecraft a few kilometers away and damage it's antennae or something. Yes, the bit with the spacesuit was unnecessary — and it ruined a perfectly good spacesuit!

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Okay, so that's the SCIENCE. Now let's add the FICTION!
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That short and entertaining video mentioned the fact that it was possible to shoot a gun parallel to the Earth's surface and have it orbit all the way around the planet so that it came back to literally bite you in the ass!

Hmmm . . . interesting idea . . .

How about a short story in which one astronaut kills another by doing exactly that? He carefully plans the shot so that his intended victim is killed 90 minutes later when the bullet returns.

Sound far fetched? Well, let's look at the problem logically — you know, they way a rocket scientist would.

First, one bullet would not be very likely to hit his victim, so he would select the AK-47 mentioned in the video, rather than the Smith and Wesson handgun, and he would empty several clips in just the right direction at just the right time.





What is the right time? Simple. Approximately 90 minutes before the victim is scheduled to be outside making repairs on the something-or-other.

Then he goes back inside and helps his victim don his spacesuit for the EVA that will get him killed in an hour and half.

And would the murderer get away with it?

Sure! Who's going to suspect that the poor victim's cause of death was a barrage of machine gun bullets coming around the planet? The space around Earth is polluted with tons of orbiting space junk that threatens everything we put up there!

Hell, the other astronauts probably wouldn't even be able to retrieve the body, because it would drift away fairly quickly from the shuttle or space station after the bullet's imparted their kinetic energy to it.

And even if they did manage to bring the body back, would they really bother with an autopsy to discover exactly what object(s) hit the unfortunate cadaver-naut?

Not likely.

But even if they did perform an autopsy and find the bullet(s) that killed him, is anybody going to suggest that somebody fired the fatal shots 90 minutes earlier and planned for the volley of bullets to come back around in time to kill the unlucky astro-corpse?

I doubt it.

And even if they did think somebody on the shuttle-or-station did it, they can't prove it, because as soon as the murderer fired the rounds, he threw the gun away and sent it drifting down towards the Earth, where it would burn up in the atmosphere and destroy the evidence!

Viola! The perfect murder!
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Robert (Butch) Day]

In most places you have to have a corpus — not necessarily a body — to have a murder.

But what happens if the weapon used is a Colt-Vickers blaster (Forbidden Planet)?

There is only remains are on an atomic or sub-atomic level!
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Common Sense ISN'T Common

[Krel]

[Bud Brewster]

[alltare]

I thought Woody Woodpecker had explained all about how guns work in a vacuum years ago.

[orzel-w]

[Robert (Butch) Day]

Wayne, wouldn't that depend upon how far the shooter was to the victim? And which direction he fired?
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Common Sense ISN'T Common

[Bud Brewster]

[orzel-w]

[alltare]

Besides what Orzel has said, I think that the video is dead wrong about shooting oneself in the back:

An object can only travel at one particular velocity for any given orbital altitude. For the bullet to travel along the same orbit path as the shooter, then it must travel at one specific velocity. Namely, the same velocity as the orbiting astronaut/shooter. But the bullet is ALREADY traveling at the shooter's speed, and in the shooter's orbit, BEFORE the gun is fired. Since the orbits and velocities of the bullet and shooter are the same, it's obvious that, in this case, nothing exciting is going to happen.

Now, if the orbiting astronaut fires a gun in the same direction he's traveling, its bullet will be moving at a higher velocity than the astronaut and will therefore move to a higher orbit, so it will miss the would-be suicide victim when it comes back around- it will be over his head.

However, if the gun were to be fired in exactly the opposite direction of the shooter's travel, then it might be possible to shoot himself in the chest, so to speak, instead of in his back, if he had a gun that could propel its bullet at TWICE the speed of his (the shooter's) forward travel. In other words, the bullet would be moving at the same velocity as the shooter, but in exactly the opposite direction. It would therefore inhabit the same orbital path. The bullet and shooter would meet after 1/2 orbit.

This argument ignores the shooter's slight speed change due to the gun's recoil, which would change his own orbital altitude. It surely ignores a bunch of other small variables, too.

(Or not, as Orzel might say)

[Bud Brewster]

[Pye-Rate]

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With today's hand held computing devices and some creative programing, he can correct for all the errors mentioned. Programed control of the personal maneuvering unit ups the odds.
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The road to tomorrow runs through yesterday.

[orzel-w]