Well, Ka Band radar operates in the range of 33.4 - 36 GHz. Moving at .9c will give you a redshift of 1:1.9 or a blueshift of 10:1, depending on whether you’re moving away from or towards the cop.
So your cop’s radar receiver will need to operate at frequencies ranging roughly from 18.2 GHz all the way up to 347 GHz.
X-Band operates at 10.5 - 10.55 GHz, and would be a little more efficient, needing bandwidth of only 5.54 - 105.25 GHz. Still ridiculous, but slightly easier requirements.
Anyway, the new latest and greatest in police radar, the Stalker dual-antenna K/Ka Band radar, can detect speeds between 12 and 200mph in stationary mode (5-200 in moving mode). k2dave’s roughly 604 million mph would be slightly outside its operating range, not to mention response time - even if the radar equipment could manage the speed, it probably isn’t sensitive enough to pick up a signal that lasts less than 6x10[sup]-7[/sup] seconds.
Nah, at that speed, you’d make plenty of your own light through friction.
Around here speeding is just lumped into a few different categories: 1-5 mph over, 5-10 mph over, etc, ending with a category for 30+ mph over. So if you pulled this stunt in Michigan, you’d just be nailed for going more than 30 mph over the speed limit on a surface street. Which is a pretty steep fine and quite a few points on your license. (No, I do not know that from personal experience.)
Reckless driving and drag racing also sound like good bets.
A bigger concern might be the fact that your shockwave just blasted the cop into another city
Well, the police (and reality) measure speed based on how soon you’re in a new location after having been in a previous location. Think about how police airplanes measure your speed. You hit a painted mark on the road, and if you hit the next one too soon, you’re speeding.
The cop wouldn’t care that you did your speeding in some other dimension. The results affect his dimension.
I doubt he’ll get a ticket for that one. With the amount of drivers I see who don’t use their turn signals, it can’t be that strictly enforced of a law.
[nitpick] 186000 miles/s is a 3sf approximation. Round off the fine to 3sf, or use the accurate value (18628somthing). [/nitpick]
Nangleator There’s a difference between measuring speed and defining speed - if you start at A, end at B, and are visible inbetween you must have reached or exeeded the speed distAB/timeAB. This would be a good way of observing people going at a too great speed, even if its not explicitly mentioned in law. I’m not saying your wrong, but a cite might be useful
DOH! I was premature with that [/nitpick] sorry. Disreard.
Shade, I’m not sure what you mean. It sounds like we’re on the same side of the argument.
I perhaps should have said 'ONE of the ways police measure speed…"
I don’t have a cite, but I was in a car measured by aircraft. The driver got a ticket.
I’m surprised we haven’t yet seen people get tickets for passing tollbooths too soon after having passed through previous ones. Those automatic toll devices in cars ought to make that possible. And in the future, I’m sure all cars will be required by law to have Lojack-type devices in them. You’ll get a speeding ticket in the mail if you ever exceed the speed limit within the United States.
I believe the laws in some states require a human witness (i.e. an officer) to actually have seen the event. It also prevents a defense of “how did you know your equipment was working properly?”
(I’ve lived in both Wisconsin and Illinois, and I think they are among states that require witnesses for speeding tickets and the like. If the cop doesn’t show up to trial, your ticket gets thrown out.)
My grandfather got a ticket when driving through the WVa turnpike. The people at toll plaza A apparently called ahead to toll plaza B.
I don’t know when this happenned, but he told me about it 5 years ago, so it was before the whole “EZ-Pass” system was deployed on that turnpike.
“c”, the speed of light in a vacuum is the max speed of light. In air it would be something less. Thus the $6 billion dollar fine is probably overstated by $200-300. I’d demand a refund.
Speaking of drag racing…
Since you’ll run the quarter in ~.000000134 seconds by my calculations (which could be way, way off…feel free to correct), why don’t you cruise down to the local strip and race anyone for any stakes they care to name? You’d make a killing, even if you had a horrid reaction time…just my $0.02 about how to make a buck or two.
And by the way, does your hyperdrive meet emissions standards? They’d probably get you for that, or at least they would here in CA.
Your trip should make for some very interesting skid marks.
And, when you respond to your summons in Traffic Court, a life-imitates-the-movies moment when the officer produces a photograph of said skid marks… Positraction, my ass!
I don’t think that affects anything. The speed of light in a vacuum is the only universal speed limit - whether light happens to be going slower than that in the medium you’re in makes no difference.
Otherwise, we could possibly get away with it by driving our car through here, where the speed of light is only 17m/s, or around 40mph.
Someone told me they did this in Europe someplace. Apparently everyone still goes as fast, but there’s a large stretch near the end where everyone pulls over and has a cigarette or something.
When I got busted for speeding in Virginia, I was doing 88 mph and I got an $800 fine. Extrapolating that you’d be travelling at 602,640,000 mph, I predict that, if caught, quid pro quo, you’d be fined $5,478,545,454.55
to all of those who are arguing about the speed of light in various media, the term “.9c” refers to .9 times the speed of light in a vaccum, not .9 times the speed of light in given media.
