Navy test fires powerful electromagnetic 'railgun'

0 Comments | AFP, January, 2008

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The US Navy test fired the world's most powerful electromagnetic railgun Thursday, launching a projectile at a velocity of 2,500 meters per second, or 5,600 miles per hour, into a bunker.

The test marks the latest step in US efforts to develop a futuristic naval gun that can hit a target more than 200 nautical miles away with a non-explosive slug traveling at between five and seven times the speed of sound.

Instead of chemical propellants, the railgun uses electromagnetic energy to propel a slug along rails before launching it at a velocity of about Mach 7, officials said.

"The gun is designed to launch these projectiles extremely far, somewhere in the neighborhood of 200 nautical miles, and their impact velocity is extremely high,...