Rail guns are perhaps the most awesome advancement in the world of throwing projectiles at things. The Navy broke their own record a while ago by firing a rail gun that impacted its target with 33 megajoules of force. How can you make something that bad ass even more bad ass? How about if those projectiles happen to fire missiles? The Navy has successfully launched their first fighter jet using a rail gun.
Well technically it’s not really a rail gun but it runs off of the same principal. The electromagnetic launchers are being developed to replace the current steam catapults used on air craft carriers to fling fighter jets forward with enough velocity to attain flight on carriers’ short runways.