> Ignoring, for the moment, the woeful lack of understanding of economics > that > the Traveller setting demonstrates, thisn't isn't really a > technology-driven > development. It's more a change in knowledge and in attitude. In real > history, before the early 20th century, a lifeboat wouldn't really do you > much good. It was for show. With improved search and rescue techniques, > survival in a lifeboat became possible, so concerns about making them > survivable increased. There's no reason a lifeboat made of TL6 techniques > and materials couldn't be made enclosed.
In the real world enclosed lifeboats came in the late 70s, and I don't think SAR made great strides right then. Satcoms on larger civilian ships came in 82 with INMARSAT, a couple of years later. And while enclosed lifeboats can be sailed or rowed, their widespread introduction also required engines on lifeboats, which were not really common at TL6. > > It has a radio, which is pretty good for 60s or early 70s > > tech. Many lifeboats still had to make do with a portable > > station shared between several lifeboats of a ship. > > Well once you've got GPS (and if you tell me that a planet that exists to > support *ORBITAL* miners, and which has regular trade of bulky, heavy > things > between surface and orbit doesn't have GPS, I'll laugh at you so hard I'll > require supplemental oxygen.), it makes a whole lot of sense to use it. Actually outer system miners. > The > cost of modern (21st century earth) EPIRB is pretty low, and they're not > exactly cutting edge tech. They consist of a GPS receiver, some control > circuitry and a radio transmitter (and it's not a terribly sophisticated > transmitter. it transmits a simple digital code at a fixed frequency at > low > power (5W, with a low duty cycle). The packaging and relatively low > demand > is what makes them cost anything at all. ISTR that most such beacons are free-float models independent of the vehicle (and in fact activated by removing them from their sockets). That would make them part of the payload, not part of the vehicle. > What I meant is how you get the lifeboat from the mother ship into the > water. I was following the sequence of whips. (I think the whole > situation > rather unlikely from an economic point of view. More so than most > Traveller, even.) TL7 external cradles, which probably means gravity roller track davits for the big ship and a single point davit on the little ship. _______________________________________________ GurpsNet-L mailing list <[email protected]> http://mail.sjgames.com/mailman/listinfo/gurpsnet-l
