Interesting, I hadn’t realized the range was so short. I guess if they did trans-Pacific it would mostly be limited to Seattle to Tokyo, or routes with a stopover in Hawaii.
I think the real advantage would be for transpacific flights. San Francisco to Tokyo is currently about 11.5 hours, assuming a similar ratio (maybe slightly better due to flying supersonic for longer), Boom’s time would be around 6.5 to 7 hours. Savings would be more significant for East Coast flights, ATL-HND would go from 14.5 hours to under 8.5.
Old World Vultures are not closely related to New World Vultures (which are closer to storks). The mechanism which kills vultures in India and Africa does not present the same issue in vultures native to North America.
But the severity of Chernobyl definitely fomented anti-nuclear sentiment much further than it had been. It “showed” that a major radiological release could happen in a civilian power plant (nonwithstanding that such designs weren’t used in Germany). Ultimately the formation of the sentiment was a process, of which Chernobyl is a core part.
1. Being on the front lines of the Cold War, in the event of a hot war, most nuclear weapons would be used in West Germany. (Yes, weapons aren’t power plants, but they can be hard to separate in popular discourse.)
2. Plans to build a nuclear power plant at Wyhl were opposed by locals, who occupied the site, and were forcefully removed by police. This was broadcast on television and helped galvanize the anti-nuclear movement.
3. The Chernobyl accident led to fallout being deposited on German soil, which furthered opposition, and in my view, was the killing blow.
DC has an advantage in newness and in materials selection (tiny tiles with lots of grout looks cool for 5 minutes), as well as having relatively fewer station layouts.
No, it gives off alpha particles and gamma rays. Hypothetically, you could build a device to harvest that energy (along the lines of an RTG), but the energy density and conversion efficiency would be laughable, given the 3.8 day half-life and gaseous state.
I wonder what the other three places are that store nitrate film? I would guess the National Archives and some facility in Southern California. Where else though?