Differences between how a EMP would affect a modern jet vs small piston engine aircraft?

Question

Will a EMP destroy the computers on a modern jet and engines; and what about any instruments such as the artificial horizon.

Answer 1

Any modern power plant is all computer controled. jets usually always has besides the pulse jet. car engines use high current low amp current to fire the spark plugs so that would kill that right off so even old vehicles would not run. so a new computerized one would be toast. there are many alternatives to fossil fuels that require no input to run such as the stirling engine. if you want to run fossil fuels look at a flame licker engine. its pretty neat a diesel from back in the day would still be on the road being there are not many electronics. this is a pretty opened ended question with many answers so expect many answers but in short there are no vehicles currently produced that would run if an emp were to hit the usa. and a jet has more than an artificial horizon. the math a computer does for a car engines injection is horrendous on its own. imagine a jet engines fuel delivery system... no way would it work and not to mention most jets nowadays dont even have direct hookups to the controls, its all computerized and electric motors, they pretty well could fly themselves but would you get on a plane that doesnt have a pilot?

Answer 2

If it was theoretically possible to get to the event horizon then once past the event horizon a piston engine aircraft or subsonic jet plane would become spaghettified into a long ribbon hundreds of miles long.

A supersonic plane may be able to use full thrust to slow down its descent into the event horizon but it too would be pulled deeper and elongated. Not event light can escape. Your radio and navcom signals would not even pass beyond the even horizon they like the aircraft would be pulled towards the point of singularity.



Your question on EMP would be complicated. Einstein said their is a connection between space time and electromagnetism, no doubt the immense EMP forces even outside the blackhole would damage equipment but the EMP to would be drawn towards y

The point of singularity and beyond the current understandings of math and physics, perhaps to another dimension.

Answer 3

EMP is all about unshielded wire length. Many aircraft already receive EMPs larger than any that can be produced by man - lightning strikes. I have worked on the avionics in a small jet (a Falcon) that took a lightning strike on the ground. The ADF sense input and the radar receiver were killed (no surprise for either of those) and many more devices failed within the next six months.



Lightning is a worst case scenario. The metal fuselage makes most aircraft hard targets for EMP, and the standards for wiring make them harder still.

Answer 4

An EMP bomb has a very limited volume of effect - the inverse square law applies. if you are thinking of nuclear weapons then they can (within a fairly small footprint) fry all semiconductors - so ANY modern engine will die in the event if it is running.

EMP devices using conventional explosives (yes they exist and no army talks about them) would have a small footprint - perfect for sabotage (nail every transformer on a continent if rubbish is tolerated) but a device on an airplanre big enough for EMP to reach the engines would just blow the aircraft apart anyway.

Answer 5

While most modern airplanes depend on electronics to navigate and to keep the engines running, there's a good possibility that older piston powered airplanes wouldn't be greatly effected by an Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP). They use magnetos for ignition, "steam" gauges for navigation, and some of them don't have any electrical systems at all.

Answer 6

What video game has you worked up over EMP? This is not a daily thought worry.

Answer 7

Duh... shielded wire. Do you know what that is? In all reality, EMP is Bovine Excrement.