Subject: (whorl) vampires rocket from Green to Blue

From: Michael Andre-Driussi <mantis at sirius.com>
Date: Fri, 01 Sep 2000 12:46:21 +0000

Robert Borski wrote:

>Of course, maybe the inhumi can fly faster than 50mph, although I'm still
>not sure how they propel themselves over that 105,000 miles of void. (I'll
>spare you my theory about short digestive tracts and le Petomaine-type
>locomotion.)

Oh good, I was going to mention bio-rocketry!

I was also toying with making ablative re-entry shields from polar ice (ah,
but this adds to the liftoff mass; a handy field of comet ice already in
orbit?), or bio-ceramic heat tiles that could be generated, or maybe the
inhumi can become "gaseous" like movie vampires (at which point maybe they
could play with their own density for smooth, slow re-entries?).  These are
all just playful thoughts toward the landing side: the problems of lift-off
seem a tad more difficult.  (Vernean supercannon?)

The gravity tide created by the close encounter is enough to raise huge
tides (obviously: even puny Luna raises tides around here).  Given a really
high mountain (Mount Everest) as the launch pad and the gravity assist of
the other world swinging into the sky, I wonder how low the escape velocity
(of a 1 g world) could possibly become?  That is, I wonder if a Blue/Green
"Lagrange Point" would dip deep into the world's atmosphere . . .

No, no of course not.  But where would the L-point be at closest conjuction?

=mantis=

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---

From: Kevin J. Maroney <kmaroney at ungames.com>
Date: Tue, 05 Sep 2000 14:25:08 +0000

>seem a tad more difficult.  (Vernean supercannon?)

We know the inhumi can fly on Blue. If the inhumi can spread themselves
thin enough to drift down in the atmosphere of Blue, then they don't need
heat shielding. Our space vehicles need serious heat shielding because on
re-entry they are basically falling through atmosphere, not flying or
gliding. 

One engineer I know described the Space Shuttle's reentry as being "as
graceful as a falling brick". Compare this to the flight of a low-orbit
airplane like the U-2--the U-2 didn't have much in the way of heat
shielding, because its descent was controlled flight. 

I agree that the problem of launch from Green is by far the more puzzling,
unless the inhumi can somehow teleport (because of residual Neighbor blood
making distance less certain?). 

-- 
Wombat, a.k.a. Kevin Maroney kmaroney at ungames.com
Kitchen Staff Supervisor, New York Review of Science Fiction
http://www.nyrsf.com