NERVA's an acronym for Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Application. It was a design for a nuclear thermal rocket engine. History The NERVA rocket engine was based on Kiwi nuclear reactor technology (the original flightless nuclear thermal rocket designs were named after the Kiwi, a flightless bird native to New Zealand). In the early 1960s NASA planned to use NERVA to power a RIFT (Reactor-In-Flight-Test) nuclear stage to be launched in the early 1970s. The completed NERVA would be a nuclear… (More on Nerva)