McAuliffe, Skyhook and Alexandria...

Dundradal

Frog Blast the Vent Core!
This is what happens when I have to make art.

You can see in this picture the Skyhook space elevator, the massive Alexandria space station and part of the fleet docked alongside.

Enjoy! :D
 

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That is the best fan interpretation of the Skyhook and Alexandria ever done.

You can't argue with that because it is the ONLY fan interpretation of the Skyhook and Alexandria ever done.

:p
 
these are obviously not WC images and not licenced but a search around th net revealed:

http://artect.net/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/spaceelevatororbit.jpg
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SpaceElevator
(the A.C.Clarke book Fountains of Paradise mentioned on there is a good book and I was originally looking for the cover of that to post!)
and here it is:
http://djuna.cine21.com/xe/files/attach/images/5656/527/129/1.jpg

also
http://www.impactlab.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/space-elevator-344.jpg
http://dvice.com/pics/spaceelevator2.jpg
http://www.simonvdb.be/projects/se01_print1_ntx_klein.JPG

as i say they may not be of use, but they're a little better than dund's mock up (which in turn is 10 times better than anything I could do!)
 
these are obviously not WC images and not licenced but a search around th net revealed:

http://artect.net/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/spaceelevatororbit.jpg
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SpaceElevator
(the A.C.Clarke book Fountains of Paradise mentioned on there is a good book and I was originally looking for the cover of that to post!)
and here it is:
http://djuna.cine21.com/xe/files/attach/images/5656/527/129/1.jpg

also
http://www.impactlab.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/space-elevator-344.jpg
http://dvice.com/pics/spaceelevator2.jpg
http://www.simonvdb.be/projects/se01_print1_ntx_klein.JPG

as i say they may not be of use, but they're a little better than dund's mock up (which in turn is 10 times better than anything I could do!)


I don't know that it works to say that the skyhook is a space elevator. From the descriptions in the book (which I've been exclusively reading over for the last several weeks) it seems to be a much more rigid structure, as opposed to a bunch of cables for transport of goods/people/energy straight up and down.

The book talks about pieces of the skyhook falling off as the vibrations hit it, literally shaking itself to pieces. This strongly implies that it's more then just a cable (or bundle of cables) running up and down.

This was a result of thrusters firing to try to keep it aligned with the planet (which again, implies that there is no 'play' in the skyhook, which you would expect from something that was primarily cable based).

I gotta say though, the whole idea that the Orbital Base is just a massive spiderweb of docking arms was pretty foreign to me. I actually thought the Skyhook looked something like the Perry outposts, they seemed ideal to me be attached to the top of a skyhook, but the book obviously proves that interpretation wrong.
 
Hmm, okay, so you're right it's not really a space elevator, but it is there to provide power and supplies and it's still a fixed rigid structure (from a physics point of view then, even more suspect than the space elevator!) so it would I imagine have similar feel to it.

That all said, pretty much any book with a description of a space elevator under attack discusss the fact that a couple of thousand mile long cable is
a) pretty damn heavy
b) in order to carry anything heavier than a gnat is pretty thick (and frankly any design for one is also going to need stabilising thrusters because they too have next to no 'play' in them
c) when it comes down will cause a massive amount of damage

I have to say though, that given the need for thrusters and armour to protect the presumably massive power cables (which lets face it must be huge to support an entire starbase of shielding AND allow many battleships and carriers to power down while in dock) the structure must be fairly massive and i'd say the structure would be as large if not larger than that seen in a space elevator.
 
That is the best fan interpretation of the Skyhook and Alexandria ever done.

You can't argue with that because it is the ONLY fan interpretation of the Skyhook and Alexandria ever done.

:p

Winner by default!

Are those New Mexico Class Battleships moored to it?
 
Winner by default!

Are those New Mexico Class Battleships moored to it?

Pffttt NO! They are New Mexico Class Space Battleships :p

I thought about using the New York Class (since that's what the USS Texas is and from S*S we learn the dreadnaughts in AS are Texas Class :p )

Now to the real deal....

I kind of imagine the Skyhook to be similar to the New Mombasa Elevator seen in Halo 2 and 3. It has cables, but also has some rigid structure. Perhaps the Skyhook is along those lines?

I don't have AS handy at the moment, but could the cables be enclosed in a rigid/armored structure to protect them and the massive power lines that provide shielding to the base?
 
Unfortunately, I think I-wars intro would cloud my interpretation of a skyhook and space elevator
 
If you're interested in seeing a realistic depiction of a space elevator in fiction, I'd recommend taking a look at the anime Mobile Suit Gundam 00.

In their future, the earth is surrounded by a ring of solar generators, connected to three space elevators around the equator. They consist of several cables, contained within a rigid shell, on the inside of which train-like elevators run up and down.

You really get a sense of its structure when it is hit by a focused beam weapon in, I think, episode 43. This causes it to eject its outer shell, leaving the cables intact for rebuilding.

That show is really well animated, so their depiction of the space elevator seems very realistic.
 
Ok you guys are getting confusing. :p

Here are all the references to the Skyhook in AS. After reading it, you do get the impression it is a solid structure and not just a series of cables connecting Alexandria to the surface. It's literally exactly what I posted above. A 20,000 kilometer elevator shaft :p

Alexandria sounds like the single most impressive facility in the Confederation.

Action Stations "Tolwyn" said:
The skyhook tower linking the planet's surface to the orbital base twenty thousand miles up was one of the engineering wonders of the Confederation. He felt a bit like a tourist as he slowed down for a moment to gape, looking up, the line of the tower soaring straight into the sky until it finally disappeared from view. North of the surface base were six fusion reactors, providing over a thousand gigawatts of power. Nearly all this energy went to the massive shielding systems which protected the ground base, or was wired up to the orbital base via the skyhook. It was the largest energy complex in the Confed and supposedly made Alexandria and the ground base of McAuliffe impervious to attack. No known weapon, traveling at a speed much faster than a walk, could penetrate the shields when they were activated.

That had always been the underlying paradigm of balance between ship weight and offensive and defensive power. A heavier ship with larger reactors meant more energy for shielding and plasma weapons, the only limit being the total mass that could be contained within the jump containment fields. Physically wiring the massive reactors into the base at the top of the skyhook supposedly made the base impervious to attack… as long as the reactors held. From that fact had come the massive array of weaponry, defensive perimeters and antiterrorist security ringing the base.

Action Stations "Gilkarg" said:
"Their main orbital docking facility has the capacity to handle nearly half of their Seventh Fleet in hard dock around the skyhook tower that connects down to the planets surface." The image focused in on the vast orbital yards of enclosed docks, each capable of holding a heavy battlewagon inside a pressurized container so that repair crews could work in an atmosphere, storage facilities for the supplies, open dock stations and a terminal hub for handling half a hundred smaller transport ships. There was a vast interlacing of pressurized access tunnels spreading out from the central hub of the skyhook tower. It gave the base the appearance of an elaborate spiderweb hanging in space, with each of the ships docked into the system looking like a silver-and-black cocoon.

...

"There're more than forty batteries arrayed in a defensive perimeter around the orbital base. Standard weapons—mass drivers, laser and plasma. At least a dozen batteries are hard-linked to the ground through the skyhook tower and thus are connected to secured heavy fusion reactors so they have limitless energy to draw on. There're at least fifteen missile launch batteries as well, half of them multiple mounts that can launch at least sixty missiles in as many heartbeats. Add to that the weapons on board the ships and it's a formidable system to puncture. On the ground, at what they call Johnson Island , there are six fusion reactors supplying energy for the batteries in space and, more importantly, the shielding which completely encompasses the base, both in orbit and on the ground. The ground facilities, as well, are covered by an interlocking field of heavy batteries."

Holding a laser pointer, the Crown Prince outlined the six reactors while photo images of each appeared in the field.

Action Stations "Ulandi" said:
"They'll go for the skyhook now," Ulandi said and, stepping away from the building, with the young corporal clinging to his side, he watched as a Kilrathi bomber came thundering in, so close to the ground that swirls of dust eddied up behind it. The bomber shrieked down the length of the runway and pressed on eastwards, banking slightly to the south. Twin flashes of light ignited under its belly and two missiles streaked away.

"These might be small nukes," Ulandi said.

"Why not on top of us?" the corporal asked, struggling to control her voice.

"They want the base, but they'll knock out the tower and maybe drag down the ships still hooked to it."

The bomber banked up sharply, followed suddenly by half a dozen Javelins. Flares streaked out behind the ship, one of the Javelins swerving and detonating, but the other missiles closed in and Ulandi felt a grim satisfaction as the bomber disintegrated, the girl beside him letting out an emotion-releasing scream of triumph. But the attacker had already accomplished his mission. One of the missiles was dropped by the point defense around the base of the tower, but the second round slammed into the durasteel frame of the skyhook and detonated with a force of sixty kilotons. The heat of the fission bomb tore out half of the tower's armor. If that alone had been the effect of the weapon, it might have survived, but the shock wave now set up a fatal oscillation, the way a wave of movement travels down a taut string which has been plucked. The tower began to waver, the shock wave from the blast rushing down to the ground, hitting, then reverberating back up. Thrusters mounted along the length of the tower, which were designed to dampen any motion created by earthquakes, were now firing at full power to try to counter the blow. The reflected shockwave now hit and the thrusters were firing in the wrong direction, adding their power to the blow. The tower sheared off several kilometers above where the warhead had detonated.

The skyhook tower of McAuliffe , connecting to base Alexandria over twenty thousand miles above, started to collapse. Due to its size, it'd be several minutes before those at the top of the tower would even feel anything, but when they did and the tower started to fall, it would drag down with it any ship that was in hard dock.

Action Stations "Gilkarg" said:
Gilkarg finally stepped free of the turmoil and approached the flat, two dimensional screen as a wavery vid image appeared, shot by a tail gunner on a bomber and beamed back. Fighters were crisscrossing the ground base, hundreds of fires igniting beneath their hammer blows. As the bomber turned it showed the skyhook tower. The structure was so massive that it appeared to be moving in slow motion as sections of the tower, dozens of kilometers long, snapped off, the tower disintegrating from the bottom up.

Action Stations "Winston" said:
He turned away and looked back to the forward view, which showed the skyhook tower. It was finally beginning to move, a flickering waver as the blow from twenty thousand miles down finally arrived. Dozens of ships were still hard docked to the spiderweb array of ports. Many of them went into emergency disconnect, blowing the explosive bolts that held them to the dying tower. Smaller vessels, which had been able to start their engines up quicker, were darting away, but the heavy ships, which had been drawing power from the tower were helpless, whoever was in command on board frantically trying to maneuver and pull away using only low-energy docking thrusters. The battleshipBelarus , though disconnected, hovered motionless.

The tower started to lean over and appeared to slowly brush against the side of the ship. Due to the sheer size of the vessel and tower, itappeared like nothing more than an inconsequential bump, but Turner knew it was a fatal blow with thousands of tons of mass behind it. The battleship started to move under the impact, as if it would simply be brushed aside… then the outer hull ruptured. Seconds later the ship detonated as stored munitions let go. The explosion blossomed out, taking a frigate that was moored higher up on the tower, the frigate detonating in turn. Explosions laced across the skyhook, momentarily blocking out the view of the incoming waves of Kilrathi fighters approaching from the other side.

Action Stations "Tolwyn" said:
Anxiously he looked around. Where the hell was he? He felt as if all his senses were overloading. McAuliffe was in the background, and he could distinctly see the glow of explosions and smoke down on the planet's surface. A broken, jagged line extended up from the planet's surface—the skyhook tower, which was continuing to collapse, the force of gravity inexorably ripping it apart. Where the orbital base had been was now an apocalyptic nightmare of explosions.
 
I hope someone is hard at work on a model of this structure...I'd love to see a few interpretations of Alexandria especially...

:D
 
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