I've wondered about that. In a series of sci-fi books (the lost fleet series, starting with Dauntless), our intrepid heroes bombard military bases with BFRs. Big fucking rocks. Which are tungsten slugs coated with ceramic I think.
These are fired from light hours away at approximately 0.2 to 0.3 c. I had assumed that something going so fast would just disintegrate if it hit an atmosphere head on? The projectiles are described as "increasing velocity" as they approach, and they strike with gigaton effects. I remember reading an xkcd that showed something traveling so fast in atmosphere would cause huge explosions from air turned into plasma.
Depends on the mass of the object, of course, but at at this speed (i.e. energy) it will become a stream of particles going through atmosphere and vaporizing anything in it’s way.
These are fired from light hours away at approximately 0.2 to 0.3 c. I had assumed that something going so fast would just disintegrate if it hit an atmosphere head on? The projectiles are described as "increasing velocity" as they approach, and they strike with gigaton effects. I remember reading an xkcd that showed something traveling so fast in atmosphere would cause huge explosions from air turned into plasma.