Daniel Rocha wrote:
I think the best deal would be hold the rails by the use of balloons, which would be anchored between high mountains.
I doubt this would work. Balloons are not stable. They get blown around. They do not stay exactly in position. If the end of the tube moves around even a little, the outgoing space ship is moving so fast it will probably whack into the wall of the tube, which would be catastrophic.
I will grant that large dirigibles such as the Hindenburg were very stable in flight, and very quiet inside. In some cases, passengers did not even realize Hindenburg had taken flight. You could put a milk bottle upside-down on a table for hours, and it would not topple over. Still, I doubt you could use it to hold a track to within a few centimeters.
It would take very large airships to hold up something as heavy as a track with a space ship in it.
- Jed
