What is the fastest in the world? Most people may answer without thinking: "Light!"
Indeed, the speed of light in the vacuum is about 300,000 kilometers per second, and no other object can exceed the speed of light at present. However, for humans, no matter how fast the speed of light is, it doesn’t make much sense, because it cannot meet the special needs of humans such as long-distance travel and exploring the universe. Generally speaking, it is only meaningful for us to discuss the speed of artificial objects.
So, what is the fastest artificial object?
NASA developed hypersonic aircraft X-43A may be the fastest aircraft in the atmosphere, with its speed reaching 11,200 kilometers per hour.
. Outside the atmosphere, the fastest deep space probe developed by humans, is the "Apollo 2" detector, with a speed of 240,000 kilometers per hour.
is 240,000 kilometers per hour, which is converted into a second speed of 66.7 kilometers per second. This speed is 800 times that of high-speed rail, 267 times that of commercial passenger planes, and 21.4 times that of X-43A. Even so, "Apollo 2" is still not the fastest artificial object in the world.
During the Cold War, the two superpowers of the United States and the Soviet Union launched an unprecedented battle of hegemony. They fought from underground to heaven, and then from heaven to moon, and almost flew out of the solar system.
In the 1950s, in order to obtain various accurate data and changes of nuclear weapon during the explosion, the United States conducted a small-scale underground nuclear test at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in , New Mexico. The test of
was nothing special at that time. The project volume was not large, and the experimental process was very simple. It was to dig a deep well with a diameter of 1.2 meters and a depth of 150 meters underground, place a small nuclear bomb at the bottom of the deep well, and install various detection instruments on the well wall. The staff then detonated the nuclear bomb as planned and used these detection instruments to collect various test data. Before the
test began, in order to avoid the collapse of the deep well caused by the excessive energy released by the nuclear explosion, the staff specially designed an outlet for the deep well. With this outlet, the energy released by the nuclear explosion can be discharged along the outlet, ensuring that the deep well does not collapse.
At the same time, in order to avoid the overflow of energy released by the nuclear explosion and affect the accuracy of the test data, the staff also poured more than 1 meter of reinforced concrete on this deep well. In addition, they also welded a steel manhole cover with a thickness of 10 cm and a weight of more than 900 kilograms on the top of the deep well, firmly sealing the deep well.
With this double insurance , the researchers are full of confidence in this experiment, and they believe that this experiment will definitely be a complete success.
Unexpectedly, the moment the nuclear bomb was detonated, the reinforced concrete more than 1 meter thick was instantly vaporized by hot high temperature. Under the huge impact of energy, the manhole cover weighing more than 900 kilograms and being firmly welded to death soared into the sky, soaring up to 90,000 miles, not knowing where it was going.
Why does a controllable small nuclear test cause such great power? What exactly happened?
It turns out that due to the calculation error of scientific researchers, the actual nuclear explosion equivalent of this nuclear bomb is 50,000 times higher than the preset value!
So, how fast did this manhole cover reach at that time?
This is a data that everyone is curious about, including the researchers involved in the trial.
However, when the researchers played the picture recorded by the high-speed camera , they did not see the picture of the manhole cover flying out, they only saw it disappear out of thin air.
Later, after careful discussion and analysis, the researchers decided to turn the playback speed to the slowest, but at this time they found that the high-speed camera only captured one frame of the manhole cover.
Based on the shooting speed of the high-speed camera and the time when the manhole cover appears in the picture, the researchers learned through calculation that the speed of the manhole cover that flew out was about 252,000 kilometers per hour, or 70 kilometers per second, which was faster than the speed of the "Apollo 2" detector.
There is no doubt that this soaring manhole cover has become the fastest artificial object to date.
's speed of 70 kilometers per second is far beyond the third cosmic speed of (16.7 kilometers per second) that has escaped the constraints of the sun's gravity. Such an exaggerated speed, theoretically speaking, can easily fly out of the solar system and into the depths of the universe.
However, can it really fly out of the solar system?
The answer given by most scientists is that this manhole cover may not even fly out of the earth.
Because after this manhole cover rushes out of the ground, it will cause severe friction with the thick atmosphere, and the friction generates heat. The extremely high temperature will melt the steel manhole cover into molten iron and eventually sprinkle it from the air onto the ground.
