Project "Orion": Powered by an Atomic Bomb Machine Gun

The Ultimate 1950s Space Technology, which almost made it to Saturn

Obviously, "almost" is a key word here, but apparently NASA still has "small secret contingency plan division" which is dedicated to preserving "Orion" nuclear propulsion technology - and reviving it in case of a killer asteroid threat.
So what exactly is this "Project Orion" - the most radical propulsion technology for kick-ass space missions? No, it's not the NASA's future space capsule ("Apollo-on-steroids", some may say) - but a proposed colossal nuclear-bomb-powered rocket from 1958

Nuclear Propulsion: Getting More Miles Per Gallon
... or rather, giving you maximum payload per launch.
The ultimate BIG technology, conceived in the 1950s to go to Saturn, Jupiter, and beyond... was powered by a row upon row of controlled, directed nuclear blasts...











Maybe somebody is already building it, in the remote Canadian Rockies

With a mass of 1000-2000 metric tons and 1000 nuclear bombs for propulsion the medium version alone would have been a terrifying monster. The "super" Orion design at 8 million tons could easily be the size of a small city. Here is a size comparison of some of the proposed versions












To the stars - one nuke at a time!

Various mission profiles for "Orion" were considered, including an ambitious interstellar version (asteroid defense and mining were among other ideas). This called for a 40-million-ton spacecraft to be powered by the sequential release of ten million bombs, each designed to explode roughly 60 m to the vehicle's rear.