How much Technology was Stolen

For everyone saying there would be no wreckage from the DD's, I have to say you are wrong on that point. For a real world example with a similar amount of overkill, about 15 years ago I used to party at the one bush party spot where 5 years before that some kids blew up an old Chevy van with 5 1 gallon fertilizer bombs. 1/4 of one of those would have been enough to destroy the van. This was a similar ratio of overkill, and there were still parts around you could find in half decent condition. And this was just a crappy old van, I can't imagine that there would be nothing at all left of a warship built to take combat damage, no matter how much overkill was used against it

If there were no survivors I would assume (as everyone else seems to be allowed to assume) that the fusion plants went up like the contained hydrogen bomb that they are.

At that point any damage done by the grasers themselves is irrelevant due to the massive plasma ball that enveloped the ships.

Even if any electronic components survived at the hammerheads furthest away from the reactor they would have been reduced to irradiated slag by the god awful energy pusle burning them out and would be basically worthless for reverse engineering.

Silverwall wrote:If there were no survivors I would assume (as everyone else seems to be allowed to assume) that the fusion plants went up like the contained hydrogen bomb that they are.

At that point any damage done by the grasers themselves is irrelevant due to the massive plasma ball that enveloped the ships.

Even if any electronic components survived at the hammerheads furthest away from the reactor they would have been reduced to irradiated slag by the god awful energy pusle burning them out and would be basically worthless for reverse engineering.

Actually, if the Rolands followed standard design practices, there should have been at least two reactors. Both would be as far from each other as feasible, which would place one near each hammerhead.

Nothing as far as I can recall is stated as to whether the reactors shut down in time, but I would guess that in a couple of cases, the fuel flow got cut off in time. Of course, if even one reactor per ship were allowed to blow...

That said, since they were in orbit, and not suspecting anything to be worried about, I'm sure the reactors were running at maintenance levels, so the actual power of any explosion would be less than if they were running at combat levels.

Lastly, whether there were any chunks big enough to salvage... I don't know. My opinion is that nothing was recovered at all. Not saying there was nothing to recover, just that nobody bothered. No, I don't have anything to back that up... just a feeling.

MaxxQ wrote:Lastly, whether there were any chunks big enough to salvage... I don't know. My opinion is that nothing was recovered at all. Not saying there was nothing to recover, just that nobody bothered. No, I don't have anything to back that up... just a feeling.

Adm Byng's attitude and arrogance as shown would certainly argue against any search beyond basic SAR for survivors -- which the report to QE3 explicitly says found none.

Let us not forget that anything that the SLN recovered stayed in New Tuscany except for whatever fit on the dispatch boat that was headed for Meyer.

Weird Harold wrote:

MaxxQ wrote:Lastly, whether there were any chunks big enough to salvage... I don't know. My opinion is that nothing was recovered at all. Not saying there was nothing to recover, just that nobody bothered. No, I don't have anything to back that up... just a feeling.

Adm Byng's attitude and arrogance as shown would certainly argue against any search beyond basic SAR for survivors -- which the report to QE3 explicitly says found none.

Let us not forget that anything that the SLN recovered stayed in New Tuscany except for whatever fit on the dispatch boat that was headed for Meyer.

Yep... I agree with you. Forgot about the report to Liz, though, so thanks for that.

Hi Silverwall,

The computer ate my first draft in the blink of an eye so here's what I remember.

Absolutely right!

Kudos!

Guys, before you dredge up an extinct equine like this again. please read the pertinent section of SFtS or whatever first please, because this is one of the most ludicrous threads I've seen here.

Perhaps we should have a list at the top of the forum?

Do we need to have a rule that such silly threads require at least some textev before putting them onto the forum?

First, please get the details straight.

There were two Nevada squadrons and one Indefatigable, plus only 5 DD's not 8.

That's why Mike took one of each back with her.

The 2 dozen plus Grasers and roughly a dozen Lasers on each target would have totally destroyed all three absolutely helpless 'tin can's'.

SLN energy weapons from the textev that too many here have apparently forgotten aren't that bad by RMN standards, but claiming ridiculous ranges or effectiveness for them without any textev or rational logic boggles the mind.

5 million km is simply absurd, though another poster expressed it better.

Secondly, regarding the 2 fusion reactors each Roland has, if each fireball were in the low megaton range, their fireballs would be in the 150m+ radius range in a millisecond [ie everything vaporized,] then increasing to ~2200m in about ten seconds, while everything within 1000m is instantly "totally destroyed" and unrecognizable.

If the reactor explosions are 'only' 50 megatons each, ie half of Star Trek's USS Enterprise's single fusion reactor destructive power, everything within 20 km is 'totally destroyed" with 1+km vaporization radius.

Given a 3-400m long ship (Nike is 998m), there was darned little debris able to escape both fireballs, and minutely even less that reached escape velocity to eventually fall into the sun.

Thirdly, because they're in orbit, there was darn little time too recover any tantalizing tech tidbits.

Almost all debris would have burned up rather quickly in reentry, while all efforts were directed at SAR, including the space station where the explosive was far smaller (200Kt), and the victims 160+ times more numerous, so which do you think got the most effort?

Any rather large debris pieces -ie that precious manty tech- which might have caused civilian casualties impacting or exploding in the atmosphere or on the surface were presumably quickly destroyed by FF's second volley for that priority reason above any tech recovery.

Trying to recover any shards after reentry was worthless, as Theisman noted and complemented Honor in ART on how well the RMN's security programs turn all the truly vital stuff into molycirc slag.

Fourth, While the FF officers might well have wanted to check for tech, given how carefully watched they were by Byng's staff (apparently quite competent at that), that wasn't going to happen if there had been any such an opportunity.

Fifth and finally, Tristram didn't bug out immediately, it watched the whole post SAR attempts as QE III's report made clear.

While some people love to play devil's advocate, there are more worthwhile subjects here.

So let it go and let's move on, this extinct equine has been pulped.

L

Silverwall wrote:If there were no survivors I would assume (as everyone else seems to be allowed to assume) that the fusion plants went up like the contained hydrogen bomb that they are.

At that point any damage done by the grasers themselves is irrelevant due to the massive plasma ball that enveloped the ships.

Even if any electronic components survived at the hammerheads furthest away from the reactor they would have been reduced to irradiated slag by the god awful energy pusle burning them out and would be basically worthless for reverse engineering.

lyonheart wrote:Fifth and finally, Tristram didn't bug out immediately, it watched the whole post SAR attempts as QE III's report made clear.

Nitpick: The report cited by QE3 in the textev I posted earlier was NOT from Tristam's surveillance, it was from Adm Gold Peak's after action report on Adm Sigbee's surrender -- eg from captured Solarian databases.

This is completely unsupported from the text. In fact, the text has the complete opposite conclusion. Everyone on those 3 destroyers died. The ships were not at battle stations, so no one was skin suited, nor the compartments sealed and depressurized. Getting hit with BC level energy weapons would have torn that ship completely to shreds from the primary effects alone, and secondary effects (e.g. shockwaves, explosive decompression, fusion plants dying, etc) would have destroyed whatever was left. Even if any compartment was large enough to house survivors, it would have been been hopelessly breached so the people would still be dead. Since it has been clearly stated that all 3 destroyers were lost with all hands, the burden of proof is on you to provide solid, incontrovertible evidence - not wild conjecture - that anyone survived. And the same applies to the notion that the SLN has its hands on Alliance technology off of Chatterjee's ships despite the fact that there is literally no possible way for it to get back to the League.

HB of CJ wrote:Time to say thank you all. Now I am going to be "Hoist By His Own Petard". I am going to "assume" that the Sollie Navy, (pick which one) has SOP, (standard operating procedure) to do many things after an active shooting incident.

In fact I would assume the Sollies are hip deep in SOP. They have had time to keep piling it deep and deeper.

This would include, I assume, to conduct search and rescue operations after blasting somebody, even the enemy. Particularly friendly destruction. The space station had just blown up. Full of friendly people. Space full of debris.

Also include debris from 3 Manti Cans. Big ones, but still cans. Lots of pieces of both the space station and enemy ships. Which is which? What about search and rescue? The aftermath would include the search for survivors? We hope so.

The Manti Cans would NOT BE VAPORIZED! Big and small pieces would survive. Some large enough for survivors.

Lots of junk flying around the planet. I still think some Sollie would take it upon him or herself to go by the book, which would be to examine each big piece for survivors. I would not depend upon just scanners. I would look and see.

I am going to assume infrastructure was already in place and went into local mode doing the S&R without Byng's awareness.

Thus the distinct possibility of recovering both Sollie and Manti pieces. This may include Manti teck. It may include alive or dead human bodies recovered for burial. High teck can come in very small pieces. My read. HB of CJ (old coot)

Duncan323 wrote:For everyone saying there would be no wreckage from the DD's, I have to say you are wrong on that point. For a real world example with a similar amount of overkill, about 15 years ago I used to party at the one bush party spot where 5 years before that some kids blew up an old Chevy van with 5 1 gallon fertilizer bombs. 1/4 of one of those would have been enough to destroy the van. This was a similar ratio of overkill, and there were still parts around you could find in half decent condition. And this was just a crappy old van, I can't imagine that there would be nothing at all left of a warship built to take combat damage, no matter how much overkill was used against it

No, that is nothing even remotely close to the same level of overkill.

Even a single hit from a BC graser can completely gut a DD. By some texts, possibly even through a sidewall.

Use 50 of those bombs instead of 5 and you MIGHT be approaching the level of overkill.

However, that is also a dreadfully poor comparison, as fertilizer bombs are relatively slow explosives, while graser energy is poured into the target at a drastically high rate, far beyond what any kind of explosives can manage.

Try doing that demolition again, this time with 50 gallons of pentyl and you might get at least a better comparison.

But even then, some larger parts will likely survive, because explosives does not affect the van like an energy weapon would.

Explosives crushes with the shockwave, energy weapons vaporises by direct contact.
With that much pentyl you MIGHT manage to get the explosive flash powerful enough to be similar to being hit with energy weapons, maybe.

You would have to essentially place shaped charges pointed at every single part of the van all at once to get a more comparable result.

Probably the closest example we have in the series of the kind of firepower that each DD suffered is the destruction of PNS Rapier at Cerberus. She was struck down the throat by the graser fire of four battlecruisers, four heavy cruisers, and two light cruisers. Her fusion bottle let go, and the resulting explosions "consumed [the splintered fragments of her hull] in the instant that they consumed them along with her entire crew."

There was nothing at all left of PNS Rapier.

Now, PNS Rapier was caught without sidewalls because she had her T crossed, but Rapier was a heavy cruiser and was struck down the throat, which if you're going to be hit without sidewalls is at least the part of the hull with the most armor. She also was a heavy cruiser, with heavy cruiser armoring.

The Rolands were struck by more graser fire each than Rapier was. They were smaller targets, they were unarmored, and they're much, much more fragile than a Sword-class Heavy Cruiser. There's a reasonably good chance that the battlecruisers had shots at the completely vulnerable tops and bottoms of Chatterjee's ships, because none of them had their wedges up. And, on top of all that, the range was much shorter than it was at Cerberus.

There was nothing left of Chatterjee's ships.