18 thoughts on “Jordin Kare”

  2. One of the two talks I’ll be giving this fall at Tennessee Valley Interstellar Workshop is essentially a slight update with a few improvements to his very original concept of the Fusion Pellet Runway (or, as he memorably characterized it when I first heard him describe it, the “Bussard Buzz Bomb”). I will always be glad that I reached out to him to talk about it just before he went in to the hospital, so at least he knew that work, which as far as I can tell he never published, wouldn’t be forgotten. A very original thinker whose ideas show up in many different areas.

    1. Sad to hear of the news. Kare was a truly original thinker on beamed propulsion.
      My opinion, we are close to achieving beamed propulsion orbital access and perhaps also interstellar flight. It’s a shame Kare won’t be here to witness the successful culmination of his work.

      Bob Clark

  3. I met Jordin at many Space Access conferences and always felt extremely encouraged about the future after chatting with him. I think his ideas on laser launch represent our best long-term solution to space access – much better than a space elevator. Let’s hope his work will eventually prove fruitful and help us become a truly space-faring civilisation… ad astra per aspera.

  4. Speaking of space generations, who’s the next gen Jordin? Who should folks look to when it comes to laser launch?

    1. He’s more into microwaves than lasers but Kevin L.G. Parkin for example is known for beamed power propulsion. He’s from my generation though.

        1. I didn’t know Richard Garriot was married. Thanks for the heads up. I read a bit about Escape Dynamics. The concept seems interesting but I have to assume the system test with helium was just for a prototype. Other similar systems I read about in the past used hydrogen as a propellant, which is a lot cheaper, plus you can use LOX augmentation with hydrogen.

        2. Read a bit more about it. The design of the vehicle seems kinda complicated. A winged vehicle with a heat sink. No wonder they ran out of money. I suppose the winged vehicle might be a necessity if it takes too long to heat the heat sink or whatever so it would require a longer ascent to space. It is one reason why I think the ablative concepts are more viable on the short term. The other is materials issues (heatsink service life, weight, etc). So Elon Musk quipped that a launch of something like a Falcon 9 payload class would use the same electrical energy as the entire US Eastern seaboard or whatever. How disingenuous of him. The Sandia Z-Machine also uses a lot of power but the thing is it is done as a pulse. Perhaps you could use all that excess daytime renewables production for something useful eh Elon? Sigh. The other point is that you could use LOX augmentation on the boost phase so it’s not like all the power for launch needs to come from the beamed power platform. Just enough to boost the ISP to a level where you can do a single stage vehicle with a reasonable payload.

    2. I think laser beamed propulsion will come naturally once we have cheap high power laser sources to do it. The basics for both endo-atmospheric and exo-atmospheric laser propulsion have already been demonstrated by several people like Leyk Mirabo. Although I’m not a big fan of his particular approach because it won’t result in a whole lot of useful payload and only works in the atmosphere. I like the ABL idea as used by other people. For it to become available lasers need to become more energy efficient and smaller.
      It can be used for small rockets today though. BTW did you guys see the news about the USS Ponce drone-kill laser test? AFAIK it’s only 30 kW, I’ve heard of more powerful systems in testing years ago, but at least it’s a start:
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_Weapon_System

      1. Not to get all Greenpeace, but could repeatedly punching all of these Ergs through the atmosphere damage it?

        1. If you’re heating the air enough to cause chemical changes, you will ruin your beam quality. The hot channel will have lower refractive index and defocus the beam.

  6. Slightly OT but was Mr Elifritz for real or delusional like the Gaetano Morano guy?
    RIP Jordin. First heard of him as a song author on “minus Ten and Counting”

  7. Never met Jordin, but enjoyed reading his stuff various places over the years. Definitely an outside-the-box thinker of the first rank. My condolences to all who knew him well.

  8. RIP Jordan

    I was on the team that competed against his in the power beaming contest so I had many occasions to meet him. More people should have his ambition and nerve.

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