(001) A Shuttle Ride To Regina

[bruce.desertrat]

Here is a fundamental question I have regarding Traveller tech. We shouldn't need to worry about 're-entry'; we're not the Space Shuttle using aerodynamic braking to slow us from orbital velocity.

I should just be able to slow our speed to near zero with respect to the atmosphere and 'float' down. We'll have aerodynamic issues when the atmosphere is dense enough to cause them, but again, magical grav drive.

Traveller tech *literally* lets you fly a brick to orbit and back. I'll wait for Eris' ruling on this but I don't believe ' burning up', now that we have power to the drives, is an issue preventing us from landing.

If aerobraking is a common thing, Pedro know this and will fly back to orbit to await a rescue. But again, by the time of the FFW, the beginning of interstellar travel is to our characters as the Sumerians are to us, or more...so this isn't an 'Apollo 13' issue it's more like a 'Flight 232' issue, hopefully with a less spectacular landing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxyN1PgfSF0

Pedro says from the cockpit "Yeah yeah, I know about the hole. Don't teach your grandma to wipe visors" as he concentrates on getting control.

[Justin3.14]

I have 2 concerns...
1) is our shuttle shaped like a Star Trek/BSG shuttle, that relies on tech to keep it airborne once it hits amto? Or does it have wings? Even with wings, we need power to control the control surfaces.

2) If its a brick, its still relies on power ... and

"The computer is resetting and bringing up systems in default mode, but it is going slowly. The power plant has reset already but is in standby mode, because the computer is reporting failed connections all over the place! Manuel control can be taken to restart the plant, and send power to avionics and the drives, but if there are live lines with shorts in them you're likely to get fire and smoke, and have the computer cut power again."

Hitting Atmo at funny angles is a bad thing... we can either skip (not too bad) or burn....

So, power is the random element...

[Keven]

Pedro says from the cockpit "Yeah yeah, I know about the hole. Don't teach your grandma to wipe visors" as he concentrates on getting control.

Carlos yells up, "Yeah, well, it'd be wizard if you DON'T burn through it again, check?" He tries getting to his feet, taking a moment to orient himself.

Basically, waiting on chargen to figure out what skills he has, so he can make a difference...

[bruce.desertrat]

"The computer is resetting and bringing up systems in default mode, but it is going slowly. The power plant has reset already but is in standby mode, because the computer is reporting failed connections all over the place! Manuel control can be taken to restart the plant, and send power to avionics and the drives, but if there are live lines with shorts in them you're likely to get fire and smoke, and have the computer cut power again."

Hitting Atmo at funny angles is a bad thing... we can either skip (not too bad) or burn....

I believe Eris said that Donny was able to get the computer up and running and power to the drives and pedro had gotten us out of the spin and more or less pointed in the right direction...I don't know if we need to make some miracle rolls again (getting 10 on 2D is not my usual run of luck! ) but this is one of those RP points where my character knows a hella lot more about this than I do. So I tell Eris 'Pedro does his pilot thing' and I concentrate on the snappy banter

[Eris]

Good questions, that'll I'll attempt to answer...

Here is a fundamental question I have regarding Traveller tech. We shouldn't need to worry about 're-entry'; we're not the Space Shuttle using aerodynamic braking to slow us from orbital velocity.

I should just be able to slow our speed to near zero with respect to the atmosphere and 'float' down. We'll have aerodynamic issues when the atmosphere is dense enough to cause them, but again, magical grav drive.

Traveller tech *literally* lets you fly a brick to orbit and back. I'll wait for Eris' ruling on this but I don't believe ' burning up', now that we have power to the drives, is an issue preventing us from landing.

I have 2 concerns...
1) is our shuttle shaped like a Star Trek/BSG shuttle, that relies on tech to keep it airborne once it hits amto? Or does it have wings? Even with wings, we need power to control the control surfaces.

2) If its a brick, its still relies on power ... and

"The computer is resetting and bringing up systems in default mode, but it is going slowly. The power plant has reset already but is in standby mode, because the computer is reporting failed connections all over the place! Manuel control can be taken to restart the plant, and send power to avionics and the drives, but if there are live lines with shorts in them you're likely to get fire and smoke, and have the computer cut power again."

Hitting Atmo at funny angles is a bad thing... we can either skip (not too bad) or burn....

So, power is the random element...

1. Shaped a lot closer to a brick than an "airframe." So, yes, without power the boat will fall like a brick. If the anti-grav drive goes offline, even if you have power, you'll fall like brick, too.

2. The boat had bled most velocity before the explosions, but it's still moving at several hundred kph. SOP would have it lose more velocity, under power, in the last orbit through the upper atmosphere (not really aero-braking with this shape, though) and be traveling slowly enough to not need heat shielding once it got into the lower atmosphere. Getting power back will, mostly allow that, but there was a critical period of time where you weren't powered and improperly angled. So, you're moving too fast and are already too low for anything resembling a "perfect landing."

3. If you lose power to the anti-grav drive again you might not have time to prevent a percipient drop to the surface...bad! If you only have partial power and/or control you might have to (a) put it down somewhere other than the Starport, and (b) have to crash land it or (c) bring the boat in for a proper landing, but likely not at the Starport. Note the italicized section above.

4. IAC, you don't have the power to put the boat back into stable orbit, see italicized section again.

5. Benton is scavenging the Thruster Plate controls to get the AG drive working, so that's not available either.

[Eris]

I believe Eris said that Donny was able to get the computer up and running and power to the drives and pedro had gotten us out of the spin and more or less pointed in the right direction...I don't know if we need to make some miracle rolls again (getting 10 on 2D is not my usual run of luck! ) but this is one of those RP points where my character knows a hella lot more about this than I do. So I tell Eris 'Pedro does his pilot thing' and I concentrate on the snappy banter

Donny and Benton are getting the power up for the AG drives, but you'll lose internal AG about a minute before that happens, and that is coming up in my next IG post. I need to get Keven and Justin's PC's up before I do another IG post, and I want to give folks a bit more time to post...some of us are a bit slower than others.

Oh, and keeping the computer from resetting, the plant going to standby, and you losing the AG drives is still to be determined. I'm afraid Pedro still has some flying to do before you are able to walk away from this boat.

[bruce.desertrat]

2. The boat had bled most velocity before the explosions, but it's still moving at several hundred kph. SOP would have it lose more velocity, under power, in the last orbit through the upper atmosphere (not really aero-braking with this shape, though) and be traveling slowly enough to not need heat shielding once it got into the lower atmosphere. Getting power back will, mostly allow that, but there was a critical period of time where you weren't powered and improperly angled. So, you're moving too fast and are already too low for anything resembling a "perfect landing."

3. If you lose power to the anti-grav drive again you might not have time to prevent a percipient drop to the surface...bad! If you only have partial power and/or control you might have to (a) put it down somewhere other than the Starport, and (b) have to crash land it or (c) bring the boat in for a proper landing, but likely not at the Starport. Note the italicized section above.

4. IAC, you don't have the power to put the boat back into stable orbit, see italicized section again.

5. Benton is scavenging the Thruster Plate controls to get the AG drive working, so that's not available either.

People near the front of the boat may learn some new and colorful curse words as Pedro works on controlling the boat by changing the power to the different AG modules in the hull (because not even Ling Standard Ripoff would be STOOPID enough to put in just one module, right??) controlling it a' la flight 232. He starts looking for someplace to put her down ASAP. getting down is more important than getting to the Starport, and hopefully by now they've heard our mayday squwak and are following our progress.

Everyone on the boat will feel the weird shifts and wobbles as he plays the AG modules to steer the ship, since we don't have thrusters, or inertial damping.

Pedro says "Everybody hang on, it's going to be bumpy!"

Manfully resisting the urge to say "We may experience some turbulence, then explode"

[Keven]

People near the front of the boat may learn some new and colorful curse words as Pedro works on controlling the boat by changing the power to the different AG modules in the hull (because not even Ling Standard Ripoff would be STOOPID enough to put in just one module, right??) controlling it a' la flight 232. He starts looking for someplace to put her down ASAP. getting down is more important than getting to the Starport, and hopefully by now they've heard our mayday squwak and are following our progress.

Everyone on the boat will feel the weird shifts and wobbles as he plays the AG modules to steer the ship, since we don't have thrusters, or inertial damping.

Pedro says "Everybody hang on, it's going to be bumpy!"

Manfully resisting the urge to say "We may experience some turbulence, then explode"

Carlos mutters "Wizard. Who the zark taught that bozz how to fly???" He heads aft to try to lend a hand keeping power to the AGs.

[joertexas]

Carlos gives her a Look. "The hole in the side. The atmo hits that, it'll burn right through." He looks forward. "Give us a bit of yaw, put the starboard side UP a bit, keep the hole above the fireline. Can we make it back to orbit?"

His Look earns him one right back. Zaki opens her mouth to reply, and then she gets the call about the injured man. Her eyes tell Carlos this conversation isn't over, and then she ignores him to move toward her next patient.

[Keven]

Carlos gives her a Look. "The hole in the side. The atmo hits that, it'll burn right through." He looks forward. "Give us a bit of yaw, put the starboard side UP a bit, keep the hole above the fireline. Can we make it back to orbit?"

His Look earns him one right back. Zaki opens her mouth to reply, and then she gets the call about the injured man. Her eyes tell Carlos this conversation isn't over, and then she ignores him to move toward her next patient.

He shrugs and heads aft to try to help keep the AGs powered up.

so who all is back there with me?

[Nuke66]

Edwardo jumps from his seat, making room for someoone who actually knows what to do. "Got It" he says as he moves to the Comm station, and tries again to raise a line of communication with the Port Authority.

"Mayday, Mayday. coming is hot with limited power.:

[Justin3.14]

Benton checks his watch, there isn't much time available.
Cycling through the grav plates I mark them with a pencil indicating their condition.

If we re route power to the most effective plates, we can lean on them.. keep the more dodgy ones on stand by.. use 'em if we need 'em... I have to attach some jumpers, but they should hold, and bypass any shorts..

With luck, we'll have a bumpy landing

[Eris]

Here's where you are. The boat's systems:

-- Thruster Plate drive (travel between planets) -- offline (cannibilized for AG drive)
-- Grav (AG) drive (land/lift in atmosphere drive) -- online, but ify
-- Power plant -- online,
-- Computer -- online, but it might reset if shorts are detected
-- AG deck grav modules and inertial dampers -- offline (cannibilized for AG drive)
-- Life Support (lights/HVAC) -- online
-- Comm System -- online, intermittent

Edwardo jumps from his seat, making room for some one who actually knows what to do. "Got It" he says as he moves to the Comm station, and tries again to raise a line of communication with the Port Authority....nothing! Then the lights on the board turn from red to amber and he tries sending again

"Mayday, Mayday. coming is hot with limited power." Edwardo sends over the standard emergency frequency. He thinks it got out and the board shows an incoming message, but the speaker is not functioning, maybe the headphones will work...

Zaki moves toward the front of the cabin passing an unconscious Sig, two clearly dead body guards, an unconscious body guard and aide who is just starting to come around. The fourth body guard is holding Sir Keen Haber's arms preventing him from putting them to his face.

Haber is saying, "What happened? I can't see! Somebody comm 'Zebra Charlie Tiger Posey on frequency 2701, got to scramble LSP rescue!

Looking at Haber, Zaki can see he is bleeding from a head wound and it looks like he has debris in both his eyes. The head wound doesn't look deep, but they can be tricky and they bleed a lot!

Benton checks his watch, there isn't much time available.
Cycling through the grav plates he marks them with a pencil indicating their condition. He starts to attach jumpers, but they should hold, and hopefully bypass any shorts.

Donnie gets the AG disconnected and everyone feels the gravity go out and they find themselves in zero g! He quickly removes the control unit and replaces the ruined unit on the grav drive.

Pedro feels the gravity shut off and then less than a minute later he sees the lights turn amber on the Grav Drive modules, then he gets some green. He can fly this boat, but he's going to have to work at it. Air speed is too high, the boat is too low, and you're off course...hell, you've no idea what course you should be on because the board isn't showing any GPS data.

Everyone on the boat feels the weird shifts and wobbles as Pedro plays the Grav Drive modules to steer the ship, since you don't have thrusters, or inertial damping.

Pedro says "Everybody hang on, it's going to be bumpy!"

And with a series of twists, turns and bobs, Pedro quickly bleeds off air speed. The trade off is the boat also rapidly loses altitude. The boat is at 9 km and traveling at 960 kph. Glancing out the cockpit window, Pedro sees a broad expanse of cloud whizzing beneath the boat.

Carlos bounces from one wall to the other as the AG goes out and he finds himself floating mutters "Wizard. Who the zark taught that bozz how to fly???" He pulls himself aft using handholds along the cabin walls/ceiling. Once in the little Engineering room he sees Donny braced with his feet in foot holds as he bolts a control unit in place on the Grav Drive distribution unit. Benton is checking wires with a hand held probe and marking them with a grease pen. A bag of jumper wires is velcroed to the bulkhead next to him.

[joertexas]

Zaki moves toward the front of the cabin passing an unconscious Sig, two clearly dead body guards, an unconscious body guard and aide who is just starting to come around. The fourth body guard is holding Sir Keen Haber's arms preventing him from putting them to his face.

Haber is saying, "What happened? I can't see! Somebody comm 'Zebra Charlie Tiger Posey on frequency 2701, got to scramble LSP rescue!

Looking at Haber, Zaki can see he is bleeding from a head wound and it looks like he has debris in both his eyes. The head wound doesn't look deep, but they can be tricky and they bleed a lot!

Zaki steadies herself with one hand against the craft's motions as she examines her patients. First, she checks on Sig to be sure that he is breathing and that he isn't bleeding out. Then, she looks to Haber and his guard. "Mister Haber, do not touch your face. You have been injured, and trying to touch it will only make it worse." She looks at the guard. "Keep doing what you're doing." The petite woman then half crawls over to the unconscious guard and also checks for breathing and bleeding. Lastly, she checks the aide for obvious injuries. "Are you hurt?"

[bruce.desertrat]

Pedro says "Everybody hang on, it's going to be bumpy!"

And with a series of twists, turns and bobs, Pedro quickly bleeds off air speed. The trade off is the boat also rapidly loses altitude. The boat is at 9 km and traveling at 960 kph. Glancing out the cockpit window, Pedro sees a broad expanse of cloud whizzing beneath the boat.

Pedro does some rough calcs in his head...at this speed, rate of descent how fast will we be going at ground level?

At 9km the air is thin enough to induce hypoxia, and bad piloting decisions. He wants to get down to breathable atmosphere but 960 kph is still 'cruising speed for a 747'...we have a long way to go.

He'll continue the same efforts to slow but keep a close eye on his rate of descent, he may have to yo-yo up in altitude to get more space to slow down.

[Keven]

Carlos bounces from one wall to the other as the AG goes out and he finds himself floating mutters "Wizard. Who the zark taught that bozz how to fly???" He pulls himself aft using handholds along the cabin walls/ceiling. Once in the little Engineering room he sees Donny braced with his feet in foot holds as he bolts a control unit in place on the Grav Drive distribution unit. Benton is checking wires with a hand held probe and marking them with a grease pen. A bag of jumper wires is velcroed to the bulkhead next to him.

Carlos sizes up the situation, glances at the setup to see if there are any obviously disconnected pieces to the controls or modules, and locates the tool bag, prepping to hand tools to these two guys if he's out of reach. He'll also look for any electronic test gear they might need.

[bruce.desertrat]

Glancing out the cockpit window, Pedro sees a broad expanse of cloud whizzing beneath the boat.

Pedro starts looking for radar, lidar or other sensors that ARE working. Clouds can often be full of rocks. What does he know about Regina's terrain?

[Fidget76]

Donnie gets the AG disconnected and everyone feels the gravity go out and they find themselves in zero g! He quickly removes the control unit and replaces the ruined unit on the grav drive.

Donnie continues to work furiously connecting the two systems that aren't 100% compatible together. Sometimes it's just a quick clip and something goes smooth. At other moments its a crazy guessing game of which wire will make the connection and which one will fry the controller. He wants to give everyone as smooth and safe a ride as possible but he mostly just wants to come out of this alive.

[Keven]

Donnie gets the AG disconnected and everyone feels the gravity go out and they find themselves in zero g! He quickly removes the control unit and replaces the ruined unit on the grav drive.

Donnie continues to work furiously connecting the two systems that aren't 100% compatible together. Sometimes it's just a quick clip and something goes smooth. At other moments its a crazy guessing game of which wire will make the connection and which one will fry the controller. He wants to give everyone as smooth and safe a ride as possible but he mostly just wants to come out of this alive.

Carlos orients himself to a tiedown and says, "What do you guys need real quick?"

[Justin3.14]

Benton stands up, scratches his head and starts pointing at one grav plate after another, tracing invisible lines in the air, his lips moving.

"This sure aint pretty, but ....."

He heads back aft, tapping back into the panel, bringing up the grav plate diagnostics he traces the same line over the schematic. Nodding uttering mmhmm's and uh huhs.

"Alright, I'm slowly ramping up power to the plates for diagnostic purposes only... I'll max out at thirty percent. If we're good, i'll increase to 50..."