Portal Gun a WMD?

[Omega V]

put one portal on the surface of the earth, and atach another portal to a slab of steel, then drop it in the Marianas trench. with 9 kilometers of water presser, the water would exit the surface portal at supersonic velocity, producing a fountain several kilometers high, enough to wash away any helpless city in its path

 

[Koeryn]

Portal is not in itself a weapon of mass destruction.

On the path of using it as such...


Uhm... Portal under the bear cage, portal into Russian Cavalry training.

The rise of the Bear Cavalry would fuck us all with it's glorious glory-osity.

Spoiler

 

[crudus]

Lava is nasty stuff, set the portal to drop it in the middle of a large area, having it up high, for example a helicopter holding a slab of something with the portal on it, lava comes pouring out, dropping host nasty goo all over the city at a fairly fast rate.

You missed the point. You can't do this because you can't get a portal in the volcano. There are no flat surfaces.

True, I forgot about that when I was dreaming it up, but I'm sure there are methods around this, depends on how much you want to blow something up.

Well there are. They just cost a few billion dollars. You could maybe get away with a few 100 million if you went for the cheap stuff. Most things hit terminal velocity after falling about 400 feet. Just fyi.

Well massive underwater flood of the large city would disestablish the foundations of the city leading to buildings falling over At least I think that would be the case anyway.

Yeah, another thing that really can't happen. Again with the volcano there are no flat surfaces in the ocean. If you managed to do you the water would only fill the sewage drain enough so that the pressure was equal on both sides of the portal.

 

[tkioz]

Lava is nasty stuff, set the portal to drop it in the middle of a large area, having it up high, for example a helicopter holding a slab of something with the portal on it, lava comes pouring out, dropping host nasty goo all over the city at a fairly fast rate.

You missed the point. You can't do this because you can't get a portal in the volcano. There are no flat surfaces.

True, I forgot about that when I was dreaming it up, but I'm sure there are methods around this, depends on how much you want to blow something up.

Well there are. They just cost a few billion dollars. You could maybe get away with a few 100 million if you went for the cheap stuff. Most things hit terminal velocity after falling about 400 feet. Just fyi.

Well massive underwater flood of the large city would disestablish the foundations of the city leading to buildings falling over At least I think that would be the case anyway.

Yeah, another thing that really can't happen. Again with the volcano there are no flat surfaces in the ocean. If you managed to do you the water would only fill the sewage drain enough so that the pressure was equal on both sides of the portal.

As for the flat surfaces you're forgetting that we could just make something to dump in there.

Anyway stop picking on my ideas and come up with your own for blowing up the world given you avatar you shouldn't have much trouble.

 

[The Almighty Aardvark]

True, I forgot about that when I was dreaming it up, but I'm sure there are methods around this, depends on how much you want to blow something up.

Well there are. They just cost a few billion dollars. You could maybe get away with a few 100 million if you went for the cheap stuff. Most things hit terminal velocity after falling about 400 feet. Just fyi.

A few billion dollars? I'm pretty sure you could make a crude vacuum chamber for significantly less.

Also, provided that the portal uses instantaneous transportation, you could use it to mess with time. I'm pretty sure that could be used in some sort of WMD-ish way.

 

[Someperson307]

I would just put a portal in the ocean and one on the side of a tall building.

 

[crudus]

As for the flat surfaces you're forgetting that we could just make something to dump in there.

Anyway stop picking on my ideas and come up with your own for blowing up the world given you avatar you shouldn't have much trouble.

Portal gets destroyed with the surface, so unless you make that surface out of dolomite then you are kind of back to square one. Anyway, the portals can easily be used to bypass America's Aegis defense system. A sniper bullet from 1000+ miles away(it is the long con to mass destruction). An army could walk through portals and almost instantly have martial law(again not mass destruction unless that is what they wanted to do). It would be fun to see someone open a portal on earth and one in space to watch the atmosphere go away.

A few billion dollars? I'm pretty sure you could make a crude vacuum chamber for significantly less.

Also, provided that the portal uses instantaneous transportation, you could use it to mess with time. I'm pretty sure that could be used in some sort of WMD-ish way.

I prefer rail guns and rockets. Those would cost a pretty penny. Even if you are looking at just a vacuum chamber you would need a large one. You need a chuck of something big enough so it doesn't just evaporate when it hits the atmosphere. I would imagine the portal transportation is at light speed.

 

[Tekkawarrior]

For people who are arguing that portals cannot be shot into space or into the ocean, the solution is simple, you shoot the portal at something flat, then throw it into space or into an ocean.

As for items accelerating at massive speeds? you can't go faster than terminal velocity, making it not the best way to end the world.

OT:Since I can't launch a flat surface into space, and since there isn't a volcano around, I'd use the ocean, probably the easiest and fastest way to cause an outstanding amount of damage to cities (and to the environment).

A more realistic thought though, that when and if scientists make this tool available, I can guarantee you that it will not be available to the public, they'le make it into a payed-for means of travel, so you'd pay 300 dollars to pass though public portals that can go from one city to another, beats flying 15 hours from NY to Tokyo don't it?

 

[Sephychu]

Method 3: Set a portal under a city in the storm drains, set another portal in the ocean, watch the city go shloooooooooomp.

I am really not sure what you are getting at here

Well massive underwater flood of the large city would disestablish the foundations of the city leading to buildings falling over At least I think that would be the case anyway.

Not exactly. Gravity might have something to say there. The water would go down the hole at the bottom, but then be sucked back in through the Portal. This flood would happen eventually, but the mass of the water in the ocean would need to force the bottom water up through the Portal. Eventually, the amount of water in the ocean would half and the other half would be over the city. Then if the water can reach the coast again, a bizarre cycle begins.

Method 2 would fail due to terminal velocity.
But otherwise... Yeah, who cares? It's not like the game utilises or even implies these acts of violence. It's still a very peaceful game (last level notwithstanding).

It's fun to thing about these things? Coming up with ideas to destroy the world with fictional devices is entertaining!

You're right about method 2 but I'm sure there are ways around that.[/quote]

The laws of mechanics? No chance love. Terminal velocity just is. You can't get any faster without a mass driver.

 

[thekrimzonguard]

True, I forgot about that when I was dreaming it up, but I'm sure there are methods around this, depends on how much you want to blow something up.

Well there are. They just cost a few billion dollars. You could maybe get away with a few 100 million if you went for the cheap stuff. Most things hit terminal velocity after falling about 400 feet. Just fyi.

The US military at one point had a plan to create satellites that could drop tungsten rods from orbit onto strategic targets. The idea was that the kinetic energy would be enough to completely destroy a bunker. The same could be done even more effectively with a portal loop in a vacuum chamber, presumably for under a million (cost of the vacuum chamber and rods).

This by itself isn't a WMD, but what if you made the rods bigger? Say 50m tall with the largest cross-section allowable by portal? Since they don't need to survive a full entry into the atmosphere, they don't need to be made of tungsten. In fact, a soft metal like lead would melt and spread out if it suddenly hit the atmosphere at hypersonic velocity... even better.

Give the machine time to speed up - 5 minutes to reach Mach 10 if there's no air resistance - and reposition the exit portal to upright at street level. Suddenly you have over 1000 tonnes of hypersonic lead carving a path through whichever city is in its way. If that can't count as a WMD, I don't know what can.

PS: To solve all 'flat surface' problems, simply install one ahead of time.
PPS: Ooh, use asbestos rods instead!

 

[Jaywebbs]

WMD? Weapon of Mass Distraction? it's a portal gun, just give it to some one and they are totally distracted for god knows how long.

 

[The Almighty Aardvark]

Method 3: Set a portal under a city in the storm drains, set another portal in the ocean, watch the city go shloooooooooomp.

I am really not sure what you are getting at here

Well massive underwater flood of the large city would disestablish the foundations of the city leading to buildings falling over At least I think that would be the case anyway.

Not exactly. Gravity might have something to say there. The water would go down the hole at the bottom, but then be sucked back in through the Portal. This flood would happen eventually, but the mass of the water in the ocean would need to force the bottom water up through the Portal. Eventually, the amount of water in the ocean would half and the other half would be over the city. Then if the water can reach the coast again, a bizarre cycle begins.

You're assuming that the portal is pointing up, if you had it elevated and pointed down then you wouldn't run into this problem. Although, even with just half of the ocean the city would take quite a bit of damage.

Method 2 would fail due to terminal velocity.
But otherwise... Yeah, who cares? It's not like the game utilises or even implies these acts of violence. It's still a very peaceful game (last level notwithstanding).

It's fun to thing about these things? Coming up with ideas to destroy the world with fictional devices is entertaining!

You're right about method 2 but I'm sure there are ways around that.

The laws of mechanics? No chance love. Terminal velocity just is. You can't get any faster without a mass driver.[/quote] Terminal velocity doesn't apply in a vacuum. You would use that to accelerate the object and then use another portal to release it once you get to the desired velocity. You would still have to deal with the problem of it burning up in the atmosphere as crudus mentioned.

 

['Aredor]

Portal in an underground oil reservoir, another portal at the bottom of the ocean. Imagine the damage!

 

[crudus]

The US military at one point had a plan to create satellites that could drop tungsten rods from orbit onto strategic targets. The idea was that the kinetic energy would be enough to completely destroy a bunker. The same could be done even more effectively with a portal loop in a vacuum chamber, presumably for under a million (cost of the vacuum chamber and rods).

This by itself isn't a WMD, but what if you made the rods bigger? Say 50m tall with the largest cross-section allowable by portal? Since they don't need to survive a full entry into the atmosphere, they don't need to be made of tungsten. In fact, a soft metal like lead would melt and spread out if it suddenly hit the atmosphere at hypersonic velocity... even better.

Give the machine time to speed up - 5 minutes to reach Mach 10 if there's no air resistance - and reposition the exit portal to upright at street level. Suddenly you have over 1000 tonnes of hypersonic lead carving a path through whichever city is in its way. If that can't count as a WMD, I don't know what can.

PS: To solve all 'flat surface' problems, simply install one ahead of time.
PPS: Ooh, use asbestos rods instead!

I have heard of that plan. It lead to some interesting (to say the least) college physics problems. Anyway, you see not only did I say "billion" because I was thinking railguns and rockets but a 50+m vacuum is going to cost some money as well. As well as a way to get the rods in there and be able to drop on command. If you tried this is portal you know the portals have to be just right so you have it fall as much as you want(so you need some nice computers and machines doing that). Besides, the rods would really only destroy one or two buildings. While that is a terrorist level of an attack, I wouldn't define it as "mass destruction". Although with this technology it very hard to stop multiple attacks.

Portal in an underground oil reservoir, another portal at the bottom of the ocean. Imagine the damage!

I see what you did there.

 

[Nocta-Aeterna]

Have you ever read Armageddon? [http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?t=118771] or its sequel, Pantheocide [http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=134719]?

A major plot point is how humanity's enemies, which have portal technology but an otherwise inferior military, can use portals as superweapons. They use all 3 of your ideas at various points, but I won't spoil the story by telling you exactly how they use these ideas.

Didn't I make a thread about that a few months back? Also, the portals in the Salvation War are different in that they are three dimensional and can be placed in any point in space, whereas the Portal portals (eugh) are two dimensional and require a flat surface, and probably are disengaged the moment the surfaces they are placed on are destroyed. ah well.

Apart from sucking the atmosphere out, transporting lava, magma, molten steel, nukes and other dangerous devices, I don't think the portal gun is a WMD in and of itself, though it can be used as one, with a little creativity.

Also, instead of spreading wanton destruction, you could use is to take out specific buildings by messing with their foundations or something similar

 

[Jewrean]

Method 2: So objects retain their velocity when exiting a portal right? Everyone has done the one on the roof, one of the ground thing, imagine that with a 20kg chunk of metal, leave it there for a while until it builds up a nice and nasty relativistic speed, change the exit portal to a major city, watch city vaporise.

Terminal velocity would be reached, a 20kg piece of metal will reach a maximum fall speed (based on size and wind resistance) and simply fall at that speed. It wouldn't have the power to vaporize a city. If it was as heavy as a large Meteorite? Yeah? That could work.

1) Put a portal on the moon (or in space). Another one in our atmosphere. Slowly but surely the air would leak out into space. Alternatively drain the worlds oceans using the same method.
2) Shoot a portal onto the Sun and another one on Earth.
3) Put one portal on the bottom of a plane. Instruct the pilot to keep flying around randomly. Go around and shoot the other portal underneath live Nuclear Bombs.

 

[Folio]

Portal next to a field full of wild animals so they can run amok in a city.

Portal one on the North Pole and the other on the Sahara Desert. Watch the climates collide into chaos.

Portal above a giant tree so that it will grow out of the side of a building, blocking traffic.

 

[Sephychu]

Method 3: Set a portal under a city in the storm drains, set another portal in the ocean, watch the city go shloooooooooomp.

I am really not sure what you are getting at here

Well massive underwater flood of the large city would disestablish the foundations of the city leading to buildings falling over At least I think that would be the case anyway.

Not exactly. Gravity might have something to say there. The water would go down the hole at the bottom, but then be sucked back in through the Portal. This flood would happen eventually, but the mass of the water in the ocean would need to force the bottom water up through the Portal. Eventually, the amount of water in the ocean would half and the other half would be over the city. Then if the water can reach the coast again, a bizarre cycle begins.

You're assuming that the portal is pointing up, if you had it elevated and pointed down then you wouldn't run into this problem. Although, even with just half of the ocean the city would take quite a bit of damage.

You are indeed, correct. Something of an oversight on my part.

Method 2 would fail due to terminal velocity.
But otherwise... Yeah, who cares? It's not like the game utilises or even implies these acts of violence. It's still a very peaceful game (last level notwithstanding).

It's fun to thing about these things? Coming up with ideas to destroy the world with fictional devices is entertaining!

You're right about method 2 but I'm sure there are ways around that.

The laws of mechanics? No chance love. Terminal velocity just is. You can't get any faster without a mass driver.[/quote] Terminal velocity doesn't apply in a vacuum. You would use that to accelerate the object and then use another portal to release it once you get to the desired velocity. You would still have to deal with the problem of it burning up in the atmosphere as crudus mentioned.[/quote]

How would you accelerate the object to begin with in the vacuum? It wouldn't conveniently fall as it would on Earth.
As you say, too, that terminal velocity would be again achieved when the object was released through the Portal into the city, presumably not in a vacuum. All in all, these mass destruction options seem rather long winded efforts at levels of destruction easily achieved in a vacuum with a mass driver.