Jonathan_S wrote:penny wrote:From the outset, I always imagined rogue grav waves to be akin to rogue solar flares. Rogue grav waves should vary in intensity, from far above normal (as I will personally label the Selker Shear for the sake of conversation) to very insanely beyond the Selker Shear. IOW, a wave that makes the Selker Shear look like a wave in the kiddie pool by comparison. Where a very special arrangement of the sails is required for certain. It may require a varying configuration of the sails throughout the trip. Much like a wet navy has to continually adjust for the wind. I am under the impression that in the HV the sails are a set and forget matter in hyperspace.
Even normal grav waves aren't set and forget on the sails. They have turbulence and variation that requires careful sail adjustment to ride through. Here's a bit from the first book explaining that in the context of Sirus's excuse to hang around in orbit.
On Basilisk Station wrote:Improved Warshawskis had tended to offset the first difficulty by extending their detection range and warning ships of turbulence. With enough warning time, a ship could usually trim its sails to ride through turbulence by adjusting their density and "grab factor," though failure to trim in time remained deadly, which was why Sirius's claim of tuner flutter had been so serious.
Now this sounds like it is largely a routine matter these days - and probably handled automatically by the ship's computers. But just because the sail adjustment might be routine and rarely mentioned doesn't mean it isn't critical to safe sailing.
penny wrote:Mapping only provides the data and unearths other possibilities. Is the average grav wave ridden as far as possible? Can all grav waves be ridden as far as possible before the ship has to exit the grav wave before it becomes too dangerous?
Unknown. Some grav waves likely extend off into uninhabited space and may not have been followed to their end. (Why bother if it's not taking you towards anything of interest?) But I suspect (though can't think of any text-ev either way) that the majority of grav waves have, at one point or another, been traveled end to end.
Also, there's no evidence that a non-rogue wave ever gets unsafe to travel in. Most wave are described as "fixed" meaning they don't move around. There's nothing that indicates that if you go far enough they cease to be fixed and start flaring or moving or occasional disappearing and reappearing or otherwise become more dangerous. Maybe they do, but I can't think of or find any hint of that in the text.
This is interesting.
From the internet.
Can turbulence cause a plane to crash?No, normal turbulence that aircraft experience will typically not cause an aircraft to “crash” for two reasons.
1. Most turbulence is well within what aircraft are designed to fly through.
2. For moderate or extreme turbulence, pilots are trained to slow the aircraft down to the appropriate “maneuvering speed” for the aircraft’s current weight. This protects the aircraft in that if it encounters extreme turbulence, the aircraft wings will essentially “stall” before the aircraft is damaged. The concept of “stall” in this case doesn’t mean the pilot loses control, it’s simply a design feature that protects the aircraft’s structure.
Having said all of that, in the golden early days of flying, aircraft either knowingly or unknowingly penetrated cumulus clouds (the tall puffy ones) that often harbored severe turbulence and thunderstorms and that resulted in a few cases where the aircraft suffered structural failure and crashed.
This Cumulonimbus is a full blooded thunderstorm. My weather display showed that there were four or five individual thunderstorm “cells” within that mass. My aircraft was at 25,000 feet and you can see that the tops of that monster was maybe 40,000 or 50,000 feet. No passenger aircraft would EVER intentionally penetrate that cloud.Today’s aircraft are structurally more robust and even better but they still avoid thunderstorms because of the severity of the possible turbulence.
Also, weather sources and onboard radar allow aircraft to avoid the worst of the weather.
If I haven't had over one hundred flights in my lifetime, it is very darn close to it. But I have never ever experienced turbulence. At least not like I did at about fifteen years old. In a crop duster! It was a single prop plane with no doors on it so the pilot could see the land that he was about to dust clearly. This was back in the day when there was no technology in crop dusters like there is now. And the industry was not regulated back then. It isn't really regulated now.
But I was dating a farmer's daughter. And when you date a farmer's daughter, expect to pitch in. We were headed to the nearby city and flew into an unexpected storm. I had never experienced turbulence like that before. Along with that turbulence was lightning that appeared as if I could reach out of the plane (which had no doors) and catch a lightning bolt with my hand! Heck no I didn't try! I was too busy trying not to $h*t my pants! But I digress. Chalk it up to a passionate attack of the flashbacks that are not under my control.
The passage says that plane crashes due to turbulence don't really happen, today. In my time they did. Today's planes are built to help withstand the damage that would be caused by turbulence, But mostly, today's planes have the benefit of much more sophisticated weather warnings and can simply avoid flying into dangerous turbulence.
Having digressed, shared a flashback and said all of that, in the HV I fully expect that turbulence is far more dangerous than it is on a planet. Not the same thing at all. But what
is the same is the necessity of being forewarned. In the middle of a grav wave, if turbulence hits I do not know if there is any kind of warning. But one thing is for certain, the sails must be adjusted in some fashion. I would hazard a guess that trimming the sails is computer controlled. I wouldn't expect manual adjustment to be able to react fast enough. Therefore, I will still suggest that the sails are a set and forget matter, besides adjusting for speed and computer controlled trimming of the sails due to turbulence. There might be minor adjustments of the sails throughout the trip even in a normal grav wave; which I believe would also be accomplished under computer control.
I am positing an insanely powerful rogue grav wave that also appears to be very very random. But what is more dangerous is its inherent turbulence that is so severe that it is always fatal. It has the sort of turbulence that normal computers cannot adjust for because perhaps the sails cannot be trimmed in the fashion that need be.
Text implies that there are rogue waves that have caused destruction and as a result, certain waves are avoided. The MA loves a challenge. If all mere mortals are avoiding a grav wave, and the MA is not, then there might be areas of space that are inaccessible to mere mortals. Especially if these roguish rogue grav waves exist in an area of space that is a veritable freak rogue grav-wave storm.
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The artist formerly known as cthia.
Now I can talk in the third person.