Soul Shocker
Not too sore, are you?
- Joined
- Jul 21, 2016
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My qualifications are uni classes two decades ago, but it's fairly basic stuff. Nuclear reaction releases energy in the form of high energy short lived radiation wavelengths (x, gamma, light, etc), without an atmo to absorb a high percentage of that energy (no overpressure wave) then the blast wave (thermal wavelengths) and the radiation are pretty much all that is left, thus the explosion is more concentrated producing higher temperatures for longer, the higher energy will also turn far more matter (lunar regolith) radioactive.
The crater still glowing hot for far far longer than it would on earth is also part of the process, no atmo to help with that part of convection, so most of the energy has to be radiated away in the form of light and radiation, that takes a lot longer than convection.
How does overpressure convert radiation to something else?
I would have thought the radiation would be same.
But definitely it'll have trouble cooling down in vacuum