From: "Kevin J. Maroney" <kmaroney@ungames.com>
Subject: Re: (whorl) vampires rocket from Green to Blue
Date: Tue, 05 Sep 2000 14:25:08 

At 12:46 PM 9/1/00 -0700, Michael wrote:
>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?)

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@ungames.com
Kitchen Staff Supervisor, New York Review of Science Fiction
http://www.nyrsf.com

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