i/Engineering
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What are the practical limits (size and distance) on launching a giant balloon?
Totally serious here. I would say the requirements are 100-meter accuracy with 10-meter accuracy preferred. It needs to act like a water balloon, which means that it "explodes" on impact, releasing the water. Ideally it would be good to send it 10 kms, but let's say if it's not at least 1km it's probably not worth doing. Bigger is better, the equivalent of a helicopter water drop is the target I would pick. What are the challenges? Needs to be a material that will contain the water and not break in flight, while opening on impact without causing secondary damage. Needs to be a shape with a predictable aerodynamic profile, to minimize aiming error. Has to be able to be filled in minutes, and transported in bulk (along with the launcher) to a fill spot. I doubt this is a wholly original idea, and based on my search I don't see a great solution. What I don't know is how far people have pushed-- has it been tried & failed, does the physics just not work? Could you even employ something like SpinLaunch and have a range in the hundreds of miles?5
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