Wall of Nessus

Jeff Wilson · 15 Jun 2010, 03:36 · from 2010-June.txt.gz

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From: jwilson at io.com (Jeff Wilson)
Date: Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:36:50 -0500
Subject: (urth) Wall of Nessus
In-Reply-To: <AANLkTimvjEwAgmG5PVB7l4KtCz1WnJWLH5Lyl2wQfoJU at mail.gmail.com>
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Message-ID: <4C16F552.8070600 at io.com>

On 6/14/2010 8:38 PM, Mr Thalassocrat wrote:
> This is where I get to. Sev says that the highest flying birds such as
> eagles, wild geese etc might be able to fly over the wall, or something
> like that. Wikipedia trawling suggests a Wall height of something less
> than 25,000ft. This is about the minimum height consistent with "several
> leagues", even for a 1.5 mile league.

Wolfe makes a point of many Earthly species being extinct by Sev's time, 
and eagles are endangered even today. There could be a similar shortage 
of the highest flying gesse, perhaps from Exultants overhunting them 
from flyers.

> At 25,000ft the Wall peeps over the horizon at a distance of about 200
> miles, for somebody at sea level. For somebody at the top of a (say)
> 300ft torturers' tower, it's around 175 miles.

> If the Wall is "only" a mile high, then it's maybe 75 miles or so from
> the Citadel, and ~20 miles per day seems kind of reasonable.

The increased vantage height of the towers should let the Wall be 
visible from *farther* away, rather than constraining the distance closer.

-- 
Jeff Wilson - jwilson at io.com
IEEE Student Chapter Blog at
< http://ieeetamut.org >

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