[TML] [Merchant Shipping] Some ideas I came up with tomakemerchant shipping more interesing

[Timothy Little]

On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 10:47:51PM -0400, Jerry W Barrington wrote:
> Well, that fusion plant in the back seat is pumping out a good bit
> too.  :)

Hehe, yes.


> But exactly what sort of radiation are we talking about here?  I've
> heard about it's heat, and the radio static from the lightning.
> There's also belt's like Earth's Van Allens.  But Apollo dealt with
> all those, so how hard could Saturn be?

Earth's radiation belts are completely negligible compared with either
of Saturn or Jupiter's.  I was just reading recently about conditions
at the surface of Europa - at least a hundred thousand rads per day.
Europa is actually outside the worst of it.  Close to the surface it
climbs to on the order of a million rads per hour, mostly from
protons and electrons.

Fortunately charged radiation is pretty easy to shield against.
However there is also a fair bit of neutral radiation, though I
haven't yet found definite figures.


- Tim