Fallout plays fast and loose with physics in a lot of ways, though.
But these are Mr. House's exact words when you ask him how he saved Las Vegas.
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On the day of the Great War, 77 atomic warheads targeted Las Vegas and its surrounding areas. My networked mainframes were able to predict and force-transmit disarm code subsets to 59 warheads, neutralizing them before impact. Laser cannons mounted on the roof of the Lucky 38 destroyed another 9 warheads. The rest got through, though none hit the city itself. A sub-optimal performance, admittedly. If only the Platinum Chip had arrived a day sooner . . .
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And, well, people have been working on ways to get around it in real life. And despite the weird technological disparities, they did have like 250 years on us in trying to develop new shit.
An innovative new spacecraft antenna may help future astronauts maintain radio contact with ground control during re-entry, despite the interference from superhot plasma.
www.space.com
Don't know if anything ever came of that, but an excerpt from that article.
When future spacecraft re-enter the atmosphere, a new kind of antenna might help them keep in contact with ground control, despite the fiery sheaths of superhot plasma around them, researchers say.
The technology might also help keep communication lines open to other hypersonic vehicles, such as military planes and ballistic missiles.
Hell, Fallout America even apparently fought a military campaign on the goddamn moon. Who knows what other stupid bullshit they have? Maybe their ridiculous plasma tech gave them some stupid bullshit insights?