What happens to in-flight airlines and manned space craft in a nuclear war?

Factual Questions
1

I tried finding an answer to this, but no luck so far.

Let’s say theres a full-blown nuclear war, and you happen to be on an airline flight over the United States---- what happens? My first guess is the plane tries to divert to Mexico or Canada, but what if it cannot make it out of the country in time? Could it still fly if it were far enough from a nuclear blast, or would all the radiation and shock waves mess it’s control panel?

Also, what would happen to our astronauts if they were in orbit while this happened? Does anyone know of any contingency plans? My guess here is that the Space Shuttle would land in a foreign country, I guess.

2

Nukes give off powerful bursts of electromagnetic noise when they go off. This electromagnetic pulse, or EMP, messes with electronics. From the FAS transcript of the 97 congressional hearings Threat posed by Electromagnetic pulse (EMP) to U.S. Military Systems and Civil Infrastructure:

It’s not a definitive answer, but it doesn’t sound like a cake-walk to Mexico either.
Since the shuttle travels above the atmosphere, I’d expect it to be better hardened against radiation or EMP than commercial airplanes. However, someone who actually knows may be along shortly.

3

I don’t have a definitive answer either but my guess is that any commercial aircraft not disabled by blast or EMP effects would put down at the nearest intact airport that could handle the aircraft type, rather than attempt to fly to a foreign location.

For the Shuttle, again a guess; there are a large number of emergency shuttle landing sites (basically airports with runways in the 15000 foot range, and which can take the shuttle’s weight) worldwide. One presumes the shuttle would put down in the most convenient, and intact, location; in the continental US, if possible.

4

Planes-- the same thing that happened in 9/11. A general order to land wherever. Airfields, roads, whatever.

The Shuttle–see previous item on alternate runways.

Your butt–K.I.G.B.

5

What sort of nuclear war are we talking about here? Limited or all-out? (Used to be you didn’t have to ask that question, but with new players with only 1 or 3 nukes there might indeed be limited exchanges)

A nuke explosion puts out a LOT of electromagnetic garbage, which is often abreviated EMP. It fires electronics, except for specially designed sorts limited to the military. If an airliner (for example) is in range of a nuke’s EMP pulse all of it’s navigation and radio equipment will be fried. If you’re on a “fly-by-wire” plane with a computer interpreting the pilots inputs you are in big, big trouble. Other airplanes, with a hydraulic link between pilot and control surfaces, will probably be OK in this regard. In fact, you’re best bet may be a small commuter plane with hydraulic and mechanical linkages.

However, I don’t see any airplane coping well with the massive shockwave, pressure changes, and other abrupt atmospheric changes associated with close proximity to a nuke blast. The shockwave is initially super-sonic - very hard to outrun. At a certain point the intensity falls off and it will be “just” the worst gosh-darned turbulence you’ve ever experienced. Eventually the shockwave dissipates, but that’s quite a distance out from ground zero.

If the airplane is far enough out from the center of a nuke explosion that it can survive the shockwave it should continue to be flyable to a landing, unless it’s a fly-by-wire with fried computer chips. Even if radios are non-functional and some controls are wonky. Big Boeings have been landed safely even after severe damage (significant portions of the fuselage missing, complete power loss, and other fun stuff).

So if you have just one or two such blasts, planes close in might be destroyed but the rest of them flying throughout the world should be OK. I would expect a repeat of the Sept 11 “everybody out of the pool” sky evacuation, but we’ve been there, done that. We now know we CAN land and find parking spaces for everybody. I would expect folks to land as soon as possible, and not divert to a foreign location unless they’re right on the border anyway.

And one nuke exploding in North America, no matter how big, is not going to affect the entire continent (it’s a big place). Nuking New York will upset folks in California (or vice versa) but it will not endanger flights in the air over Los Angeles

Now, if you were talking a major, major exchange of many nukes THAT’s a slightly different problem. There are remote areas with sufficient flat to perform an emergency jet landing, assuming the military isn’t just shooting everybody down by then, and assuming anyone escapes the multiple shockwaves thundering about. If you aren’t worried about taking off again afterward, a straight stretch of freeway would do. So would a dry lakebed. Whether or not anyone survives much longer after that landing would depend on fallout, food resources, and weather effects.

If it’s a major exchange a LOT of folks airborne will die either from the immediate blast or an uncontrolled plane crash. Depending on how extensive the exchange is, some folks may be able to land in one piece.

As for astronauts - they would escape the immediate effects of blast, fallout, and so forth. The real problems are

  1. whether their usual landing spot is still functional

  2. if not, what alternatives are avilable (dry lakebeds, for instance)

  3. if they must use an alternative, how to navigate to it, in which case the continued existance of mission control would be helpful - but that isn’t likely. Could they solve the problem themselves, while in orbit?

  4. how extensively the war affects weather patterns over their landing spot

  5. and, as with the airplanes, will they be able to survive afterward even if they make a safe landing.

6

No, the real effects astronauts have to worry about are apes with guns and horribly mutated relics worshipping dud weapons.

I mean, everybody knows that.

Hm. If an F-16’s (the Electric Jet, after all, the first completely fly-by-wire craft) electronics were completely fried, rendered unusable all at once by a severe EMP, what would happen to the plane? Is it aerodynamic enough on its own to fly straight and level (assuming it was doing that when it was hit) or would it hit the ground? Would a pilot be able to eject?

7

First of all, the F-16 is a military airplane. It may well have EMP protection a civilian airliner doesn’t.

Secondly - if the electrics were all fried the pilot would NOT be able to retain control of the airplane. It would crash. Unlike most airplanes, which tend to stay in whatever condition they are in at present, a fighter plane like the F-16 is inherently UNstable aerodynamically. It requires constant small corrections to stay straight and level, or whatever else the pilot wants. Hence, the use of an on-board computer to make all those corrections and give the pilot what he/she wants.

I’m pretty sure the ejection seats have a mechanical activation mechanism, but since I’m not an authority on military aviation it is also possible I am wrong. But I don’t see where an ejection system would need to incorporate electronics, or that they would be an advantage. In fact, I think it could be argued they’d be a detriment.

8

The EMP would fry every electric circuit for hundreds of miles,down to the digital watch on your wrist.Military aircraft are shielded to a degree,but it is far easier to increase the EMP than to shield from it.Back when I was still the in AF, B-52’s still had some electronics with tubes,which are much more resistant to nuclear effects.

9

Since we’re talking about missiles (presumably) the government will probably give a warning to everyone in the air (if not EVERYONE) that there’s a nuke coming, and that they should take cover. There’s a small amount of time between the detection of an incoming missile and its detonation.

I imagine a plane should try to land as quickly as possible. If it’s a big modern plane flying high, perhaps it could try to get even higher to try and avoid the worst of the shock wave. There’s no way to avoid the EMP - and you’re gonna dive and crrash from a fall at 50,000 aas well as at 20,000.

10

How close is the plane to the blast? The blast is, in all probability, an air burst, so if it is anywhere remotely nearby, the shockwave has a good chance to damage the plane.

If it survives, our government was thoughtful enough to require every so many miles of interstate highways to be functional runways in an emergency (I forget the ratio and I don’t have a cite, so neer). This was precisely so that it would be nigh-impossible to destroy our domestic runways. The Soviets went the other route- they just made most of their planes capable of landing on dirt and unimproved runways in other countries.

11

(a) Your ass is history, because the plane crashes, like, RTF NOW!

(b) There is no (b), 'cause you’re dead.

I like to be cheerful, but sometimes it just don’t happen…

12

Competely false.

http://www.snopes.com/autos/law/airstrip.asp – Snopes has the answer you need.

13

A few points -

While the EMP of a nuke can be varied, it is debatable whether or not whoever nukes the US sees a large EMP as the desired result or a lot of destroyed cities as the desired result.

For simplicity, let’s just take the example of an airborne airliner that is not affected by the shock wave but gets hit by the EMP. The severity of how “fried” the electronics get depends - like anything else there are variables. An airplane close to the EMP could have every piece of onboard electronics go dead; one farther away may only have certain “exposed” systems fail.

Worst case - what would happen on a 777 if everything died? The engines would still run, the autopilot would click off, and then you are in the hands of the aircraft designers. Airliners are dynamically stable (unlike the F-16), so nothing drastic would happen - you would NOT immediately plunge to your death. Even if all flight controls failed you could still control the airplane. Trim motors might (!) still work, and the engines are still running - the DC-10 in Sioux City had lost all of it’s flight controls and they made a semi-controlled crash using only the engines for control. I’ve landed (in the simulator, of course!) a T-1 (civilian Beech-400 business jet) after the flight controls jammed and all I had was the mechanical linkage to the rudder and the engines. It was very controlled, and very smooth.

The only variable would be how much mechanical backup there is on your specific airplane. McDonnell Douglas seems to be very good at this, Boeing OK, and Airbus is probably the worst. (The A320 is sometimes called the “Flying hard drive”). Expect a few crashes from the EMP, but nothing like an aluminum downpour.

The Space Shuttle would be unaffected except for potential landing sites. Several are maintained around the world for emergencies during launch (Spain, Africa, Australia), so expect the Shuttle to stay up until things clear out or they have to land due to onboard supplies running out.

Broomstick - ejection seats are mechanically actuated for exactly the reasons you suspected. No one wants to pull the handgrips and get a “blue screen of death”.

14

Yes, I’ve also heard that thing about the emergency runways. But it is fact that the bridge clearances were meant to allow the passage of missile carriers, not trucks.

You have to understand that the entire concept of the Interstate Highway System could only happen if the federal government found a way to “discover” that building highways was somehow included in its responsibility to “provide for the common defense.” Without some such rigmarole, the feds can’t build roads.

Sorry for the hijack…

15

Just for giggles:

Is cabin heat/pressurization mechanical or electronic? A dump valve stuck open can absolutely ruin a flight…

And trying to switch to VFR mid-flight would have to rate as an “interesting” experience :wink:

16

TBone2, I know the Interstate Highway System (at least under the Eisenhower ageis) was designed to fill the same need as the Nazi Autobahn: Military transport in case of a catastrophic war. But I’m still asking for a cite that overpasses were designed with missile carriers in mind.

The Internet was designed to provide military communications in case of catastrophic war, but you don’t see requirements that all ISPs must conform to military regulations.

17

Derleth -

Until a positive cite comes along - I worked for a civil engineering firm (very breifly). During the course of that job, the C.E.'s assured me that the overpass clearance requirements were, in fact, based on the dimension of the largest missle launchhers of the day - they were well above those required for the largest trucks of the day.

And, there are heavily-shielded data lines used for secure applications - I suspect the original military network used secure lines, even if AOL et. al. chose not to.

18

Oh, OK. :slight_smile: Guess I never hit that part of Snopes. Then again, in California, there are so many 2 mile long straight stretches of freeways that it hardly matters. :-p

19

I think part of the confusion may come from the fact that an airplane could land on a flat, straigtht stretch of road with the idea that the highway system was designed that way. It’s a little like saying the because you can use a credit card to jimmy a locked door all credit cards were designed with that purpose in mind.

The part of the “1 mile in 5” rule that told me it was an urban legend is quite simple. It takes more than a mile of pavement to accomodate a passenger airliner.

20

Not that I deny that it was a UL, but back when the US highway system was first laid down, a mile-long strip of road would have been adequate to operate the airliners of the day, such as the DC-3.