Russia announces new Nuclear Rockets for manned Mars trip

For the first time in possibly four decades, two electrifying space technology phrases have managed to show up in the same sentence in earnest. Quietly nestled in the murky details of a somewhat thrilling AP news story about a potential new Russian spacecraft to be produced in the next few years are the words: “manned […]

Tales from a nuclear rocket station

One of the great pleasures of my research into the ’60s development of nuclear rockets for space exploration are moments like the following, which I pieced together from archival records and oral history… (If I find enough of these to write, I might collect them into a book sometime. Feedback welcome.) Richard Nutley, a supply […]

Foraging for Nuclear Rocket Secrets

I spent this past Thursday at the National Archives in Chicago as one of the few humans in the last three decades to track down the project files for the Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Applications (NERVA) Program from the 1960s. The experience of using the National Archive was exactly like and completely unlike what I’d […]