Plot hole in Wrath of Khan, or am I thinking wrong?

[Spot261]

I can't really buy this idea that they could realistically mistake one planet for another without at least some questions being asked. Even if prior contact with the system had literally consisted of just the one probe flyby then Kirk's venture there to exile Khan et al, there would still be extensive automated computer records of the physical properties of that planet, it's likely orbital trajectory, atmospheric content, etc. Further to this as the Reliant entered the system she would have full current sensor readings available.
Bear in mind something as small as a ship cannot enter a system unnoticed by other vessels unless cloaked or flying in a deliberate stealth mode, a full run-down of the planetary bodies present would absolutely be available to the starfleet crew, whose very premise is to examine, learn and study every environment they encounter. Their computers are capable of storing every scrap of that sensor data in exacting detail and cross referencing the records and the live data stream. Even if that system is not intelligent enough to actively note and flag up the discrepancies it is being used by a highly trained, intelligent and experienced crew on a scientific mission who would as a matter of course be analysing that data for navigational reasons first, routine exploratory protocols second.
It is simply beyond credibility that they would have failed to notice that the system suddenly had one less planet, one new asteroid field and that the planet they were in orbit of had drastically different physical dimensions, geographical properties and orbital parameters to the one they had on record. Starfleet simply aren't that slapdash.
23rd century astrophysics may well have rendered our own understanding of the universe obsolete, but it seems pretty fair to speculate that the knowledge starfleet have gained would work to their advantage, making such errors even less likely. It may not be easy to predict a planets orbit years in advance but these people are the experts and should at the very least be able to determine that it is in fact way out of position, is much too big or small and has entirely the wrong atmosphere and physical make-up. Not to mention (at the risk of overlabouring the point) there's one missing!

 

[Nebusj]

It may not be easy to predict a planets orbit years in advance but these people are the experts and should at the very least be able to determine that it is in fact way out of position, is much too big or small and has entirely the wrong atmosphere and physical make-up. Not to mention (at the risk of overlabouring the point) there's one missing!

And it is certainly impossible in the Star Trek universe for a planet to suffer wild, extreme changes in its environment or even get blown up or disappear entirely. That never ever happens!

 

[47of74]

I can't really buy this idea that they could realistically mistake one planet for another without at least some questions being asked. Even if prior contact with the system had literally consisted of just the one probe flyby then Kirk's venture there to exile Khan et al, there would still be extensive automated computer records of the physical properties of that planet, it's likely orbital trajectory, atmospheric content, etc. Further to this as the Reliant entered the system she would have full current sensor readings available.
Bear in mind something as small as a ship cannot enter a system unnoticed by other vessels unless cloaked or flying in a deliberate stealth mode, a full run-down of the planetary bodies present would absolutely be available to the starfleet crew, whose very premise is to examine, learn and study every environment they encounter. Their computers are capable of storing every scrap of that sensor data in exacting detail and cross referencing the records and the live data stream. Even if that system is not intelligent enough to actively note and flag up the discrepancies it is being used by a highly trained, intelligent and experienced crew on a scientific mission who would as a matter of course be analysing that data for navigational reasons first, routine exploratory protocols second.
It is simply beyond credibility that they would have failed to notice that the system suddenly had one less planet, one new asteroid field and that the planet they were in orbit of had drastically different physical dimensions, geographical properties and orbital parameters to the one they had on record. Starfleet simply aren't that slapdash.
23rd century astrophysics may well have rendered our own understanding of the universe obsolete, but it seems pretty fair to speculate that the knowledge starfleet have gained would work to their advantage, making such errors even less likely. It may not be easy to predict a planets orbit years in advance but these people are the experts and should at the very least be able to determine that it is in fact way out of position, is much too big or small and has entirely the wrong atmosphere and physical make-up. Not to mention (at the risk of overlabouring the point) there's one missing!

They actually discussed that plot hole in To Reign in Hell: The Exile of Khan Noonien Singh. According to the novel the system had not been extensively surveyed and the surveys that did exist said the system had six planets with an asteroid belt on the outer edge of the system. When the Reliant approached the system they thought the asteroid belt created by VI blowing up was the original asteroid belt mentioned in the initial survey and that the outer planet was VI. Plus both Chekov and Kyle were under orders to keep quiet about Khan being in the system.

 

[Timo]

It seems highly unlikely that our heroes or sidekicks would rely on "external cues" when homing in on the planet they want. The presence or absence of asteroid fields or fellow planets should be immaterial to them, and a crutch they shouldn't have to lean on when aiming at a planet of specific characteristics. So what if the local desert planet is five million kilometers to the left of where it "should" be? That doesn't affect the mission one iota.

I'm sure some scientist somewhere way down the chain would eventually write a speculative article on why the planet had changed orbit. But that would only happen afterwards. None of that should concern Captain Terrell in the slightest - the Trek universe features endless mechanisms for planets not being exactly where, when and how they are expected to be, and most of those have no impact on the mission at hand.

[/quote]Not to mention (at the risk of overlabouring the point) there's one missing![/quote]

That's the weakest argument of them all. To see that one planet is missing would require specifically looking for that planet first. What possible motivation would our heroes have for specifically looking at a planet they don't want to interact with?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Spot261]

They wouldn't have to specifically look, we routinely see starfleet crews survey and scan a system every time they enter one, discussing anomolies and discrepancies. It's clearly portrayed as being standard practice, half of the episodes we see start from Spock, Kim or Data pointing out some unexpected detail which then gets investigated, regardless of their primary mission. We aren't talking about a small change to be ignored and discussed later, we are talking about the disappearance of a planet. To not notice such a thing is simply not the kind of mistake we see starfleet crews make. If they did and were portrayed as being likely to not notice/disregard such a thing I would accept your argument, but they aren't.

They are more thorough than that as a matter of routine without specifically needing a reason to look. In the case of a lower tech species without their sensor and computer capabilities it might be a more labour intensive task that they would only carry out if needed, but for a starfleet crew of the 23rd century it's simply part of their MO to constantly look for unexplained phenomena and to be thorough and certain of their own actions.

As for the specific characteristics, what are the odds that ceti alpha IV and V are so similar as to be interchangeable. Again, starfleet check and record sensor readings as a matter of routine. The likelihood of the two planets being so close in size, mineral composition, geographical layout and atmospheric conditions is vanishingly small. As a thought experiment try a starfleet vessel entering the Sol system and not noticing that Jupiter had disappeared and Mars had taken it's place. Again, there are concievable conditions where your argument might hold, but they rely on an incredibly unlikely set of circumstances which would at least warrant a mention in the script, such as the freak occurrence of a system with two virtually identical planets, one of which just happened to drop into the approximate orbit of the other when it was destroyed (which in itself is patently absurd - the loss of a single planets gravity would affect the dynamics of a planetary system granted, but not specifically move one planet the vast distance to take the spot of another so to speak).

Even if we account for climatic changes as a result of orbital shift, the simple fact of being exactly the same size and composition (or close enough to not warrant a mention) is simply too unlikely to accept without some on screen mention.

Again, I accept that your arguments might well apply to a less advanced, less scientifically inclined and frankly less capable species, but for a starfleet crew? I can't think of a single instance anywhere else in the franchise of a crew being so incompetent or making so monumental an error on the basics of their job. Yes there are certain phenomena in the Star Trek universe that could explain such things, but it is the job of starfleet to investigate these things, not just shrug their shoulders and carry on regardless.

 

[Timo]

They wouldn't have to specifically look

But they would - there's no escaping that. A scanner would specifically have to be aimed at this planet, and then around its assumed location, to verify that there was no planet there.

we routinely see starfleet crews survey and scan a system every time they enter one, discussing anomolies and discrepancies.

Actually, we never see that happen. A blatant case in point: in "Doomsday Machine", they are "within the limits" of system L-370 when either Sulu or Spock finally bothers to find out that the system is no longer there. And that when they're specifically scanning the system for a difficult-to-locate starship in distress, thus supposedly taking a "broad" look.

Our heroes are focused on their job. That job is not to chase butterflies or chart spatial anomalies (unless Starfleet Command specifically says it is). Their sensors can easily spot the one planet they aim at; their navigation automation can easily display just that one planet for them, sorting out all the distracting noise; and their ships can make a beeline for any planet at any arbitrary location, never having to worry such whimsical things as orbital mechanics.

half of the episodes we see start from Spock, Kim or Data pointing out some unexpected detail which then gets investigated, regardless of their primary mission.

I can't vouch for Kim, but Spock never did that. Data or Worf may sometimes pick up something that makes his console go beep, the computer apparently choosing which things are beepworthy, but those issues are quite pressing: distress signals, ships on approach, energetic phenomena that might affect the mission. Something not being there is never worth a mention.

We aren't talking about a small change to be ignored and discussed later, we are talking about the disappearance of a planet.

Where's the difference? It's not a planet they would care about. In theory, it might indicate a Doomsday Machine in action, but that would be an anomalous Doomsday Machine, plus it would have been eating irrelevant planets only.

As for the specific characteristics, what are the odds that ceti alpha IV and V are so similar as to be interchangeable.

Our heroes are not looking for "specific characteristics". Remember, they are trying to find out whether Ceti Alpha VI is suitable for the Genesis experiment. If they knew the specific characteristics already, or trusted what they knew, they'd use Google, not the Reliant.

Again, starfleet check and record sensor readings as a matter of routine.

And again, they don't - there being no reason to. ST2 is not an isolated incident. Throughout TOS and TNG, our heroes enter star systems with open minds rather than open eyes: they accept what they see, but typically they brashly beam down before scanning for plot-relevant facts with their hand tricorders.

As a thought experiment try a starfleet vessel entering the Sol system and not noticing that Jupiter had disappeared and Mars had taken it's place.

To make this relevant, both Jupiter and Mars would have to be uninhabited, and Earth just a place to be briefly visited and checked for parameters X, Y and Z before the latest invention of UFP science destroys that world for good...

..the freak occurrence of a system with two virtually identical planets..

But that misses the overall mark, which is that details fundamentally are of no interest. This true MO of Starfleet covers all the aspects of this "mystery": the irrelevance of missing planets, the irrelevance of the orbital specs of the planet they do head for, the irrelevance of whether records match observed facts.

Terrell wanted to find a world that Marcus could destroy with Genesis. His sensors spotted one in a system where spotty records apparently suggested one might be found. And that was it - it was not his job to polish the spots out of the records, as he had better things to do.

I accept that your arguments might well apply to a less advanced, less scientifically inclined and frankly less capable species

The exact opposite is probably true, as such primitives would have to make careful observations on issues affecting their Newtonian struggle towards their target - and would have plenty of spare time during their snail-paced approach maneuver to that target. Not to mention that, not being space veterans, they would still find the irrelevant details of an exploitable and expendable universe fascinating beyond their actual significance.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[DonIago]

I'm not sure what we're trying to prove here at this point...is there a plot issue? Yeah. Are there potential explanations with varying levels of reasonableness? Also yeah.

 

[Spot261]

I think the question is primarily one of just how one views the concept of professionalism, is it about goal oriented focus or careful risk assessment. In different settings the two will be prioritised differently. Coming from an emergency services background I'm with the latter and find it hard to accept that anyone in a high risk profession such as starfleet officers are would be trained to go in "with open minds rather than open eyes". No successful military or uniformed organisation has ever done that and nor will they. Assessing your environment thoroughly and making use of that data to make informed choices is fundamental to how anyone in a high risk profession operates and failure to do so costs lives, which ironically is exactly what happened in this case.
I'm prepared to accept that in this instance the Reliant's crew did not make full use of the available sensor data, clearly they did not which is how they so monumentally messed up and lost all but one of their number. To try to call that professionalism is to me very difficult to get my head round as it is an example of exactly the opposite. They had all the information they needed, they simply did not use it. The planet was clearly different and my analogy about mistaking Mars and Jupiter holds. They were in orbit of the wrong planet which almost certainly had a different physical make up and size. To realise this fact simply required the science officer to be awake at his post, not actively seeking changes to the system. I cannot for the life of me imagine the TNG crew doing the same thing.
I don't have time right now to trawl through episodes and link examples but science and tactical offices performing sensor sweeps throughout missions is commonplace in all series, instances where they did not verbally draw attention to anything anomalous may simply be taken as instances where there was nothing to comment upon, but the key word is "sweep". The sensors are quite capable of taking in the big picture and providing the user with an overview of the ship's environment, this is how they can so rapidly become aware of threat vessels entering a system, of unexplained energy sources which just came into effect. They can be focused on specific areas of interest but to routinely scan the current volume is standard practice both in star trek and real world navies and they are not unidirectional. This isn't chasing butterflies it is simply good practise and basic risk assessment.

 

[J.T.B.]

I can't really buy this idea that they could realistically mistake one planet for another without at least some questions being asked.

You are right, there is no way it really makes sense. They knew where Ceti Alpha VI was supposed to be, and to get Reliant and CA6 together in space, they would have to navigate to the right place. If the planet's not there, something is seriously wrong or they've made a hundreds-of-thousands-of-miles navigation error. Either way, that's news. Whether a planet exploded or some space god did it, it's something you'd check. Something that you would consider more seriously than effectively deciding "oh well" and continuing on with your survey of the planet in the wrong place.

The fact that we hash this over this a couple times a year is a pretty good indication that the writing there is problematic. But it's just a dumb moment in a movie that did not take such things seriously, and pretty easy to ignore.

 

[DonIago]

Nevermind the fact that without this bit of handwaving there's not much of a movie.

In any case, it was hardly the first time something basically inexplicable occurred in the franchise, and I rather doubt it will be the last.

 

[HMS Ark Royal]

Here is my solution to the issue:

Plan A

1) Form a boarding party to go over to Reliant and take control of either the Bridge, Auxiliary Control or the Engine Room.

2) Attempt to beam the device off the ship as far as the transporters will allow.

3) If 2 is not possible, set course and speed to put Reliant as far away as possible from Enterprise. (We know that Reliant was answering her helm after the torpedo hits as she went into an impulse powered starboard turn that was not the result of an impact from the torpedo strikes)

#

Plan B

1) Form a boarding party to go over to Reliant and take control of either the Bridge, Auxiliary Control or the Engine Room.

2) Attempt to beam the device off the ship as far as the transporters will allow.

3) If 2 was possible, transport as many survivors as possible to the Enterprise.

4) Set course and speed for Enterprise to escape the detonation area

5) Bring Reliant to a full stop and rotate her in such a way that she forms a blockage in the path of the Genesis wave

 

[Timo]

...Coming from an emergency services background...

...The obvious scenario here: two paramedics rush to start work on an accident site. Just before arriving at the coordinates indicated by their navigation computer, they notice a sharp left turn where the map indicates a fairly shallow one. Having never been to this part of the town, they don't at first even notice that two buildings have magically changed places, slightly altering the street plan. Do the paramedics a) stop to investigate, b) phone their employer who's technically part of the same overall city organization that ought to keep buildings from wandering off, or c) ignore the apparent error on the map in favor of the hard reality of the situation?

I mean, yes, dancing buildings could in theory jeopardize the entire rescue mission, or cause further havoc. But what are the odds? How many precious seconds will be lost wondering about the odds?

Starfleet studies the universe. It doesn't follow that every starship should constantly study every corner of the universe. Worrying about another planet in the Ceti Alpha system is no different from worrying about another planet in the Cygni Beta system, when your focus ought to be on a specific other planet.

I'm prepared to accept that in this instance the Reliant's crew did not make full use of the available sensor data, clearly they did not which is how they so monumentally messed up and lost all but one of their number.

Umm, what? The astrographical situation of the Ceti Alpha system had no effect on their mission. They went to find the desert world, they found it, and they would have detonated Genesis on it if not for a villain showing up.

What would have gone better with a more careful study of the data?

Ending up on a planet where unexpected circumstances exist is not unprofessionalism. It's what Starfleet officers do for a living.

The thing that smacks of unprofessionalism is that the heroes did not notice their target system contained said villain. Did they fail to notice that one of the planets was flagged with a warning? Did they ignore the warning? Or was there no warning?

The latter actually might be the likeliest explanation, as Kirk would have the means and the motivation to hide Khan's existence originally. Perhaps not erase from records altogether, but certainly bury deep enough that the records wouldn't be flagged.

If the planet's not there, something is seriously wrong or they've made a hundreds-of-thousands-of-miles navigation error. Either way, that's news.

Why would the latter be news? Is Starfleet navigation fault-intolerant? Can't the starship acknowledge and compensate for errors made? We know she can - hundreds of thousands of miles is probably half a picosecond at high warp. And planets in Trek can be lightyears out of place, or move fast enough to outpace starships. That's news in the sense that space exploration with starships is news.

it was hardly the first time something basically inexplicable occurred in the franchise

And that's the important point. What may sound amazing to us is routine for Starfleet. Kirk won't stop to investigate why Miri's planet has the exact same continents as Earth - it may theoretically affect his mission, but he'll phaser that bridge when he comes to it. There simply is no preparing for amazing: Starfleet personnel must put emphasis on accepting, and then reacting.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Timo]

Plan A

This depends on whether beaming is possible at all. David Marcus might be saying it is not with his "You can't", although of course Kirk ought to ask him whether that's what he meant. Or then Kirk already knows that transporters won't work in the nebula (but then he wouldn't propose beaming over, even if it were a heroically suicidal alternative). OTOH, putting distance between the two ships is something Kirk himself can rule out, or ask Sulu to rule it out; if warp is what it takes to escape Genesis, then two worse-than-impulse-crippled starships heading away from each other won't work.

Plan B

A starship-sized blockade doesn't sound likely when Genesis is supposed to transform mountain ranges.

Essentially, what we have here is a Hollywood action scene in slow motion: the dam gates have been opened (Genesis has been turned on), and the heroes either have to cancel the already initiated flood (they can't - the gates only move one way, says their designer) or run like hell (but the wave will catch them unless Spock can start their getaway vehicle). Small measures won't help, even if the slow motion may give the illusion that they might.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[HMS Ark Royal]

This depends on whether beaming is possible at all. David Marcus might be saying it is not with his "You can't", although of course Kirk ought to ask him whether that's what he meant. Or then Kirk already knows that transporters won't work in the nebula (but then he wouldn't propose beaming over, even if it were a heroically suicidal alternative). OTOH, putting distance between the two ships is something Kirk himself can rule out, or ask Sulu to rule it out; if warp is what it takes to escape Genesis, then two worse-than-impulse-crippled starships heading away from each other won't work.

I disagree...

Notice that David says "You can't" only after Kirk says to stop it - not that they can not beam aboard. With regards to moving the ships apart, when Reliant explodes as a result of the Genesis Torpedo detonation it is coming round to starboard on an impulse turn. Now, at no point were the impulse engines damaged by Enterprise's attack so we can assume Reliant had full capability there. It would have been easy to beam over and set the ship on a heading directly away. Looking at the way the rings formed as a result of the detonation, it appears as if they followed Enterprise's escape because of the 34 degree list on the starboard turn of Reliant. If this is the case, and visual evidence suggests so, by sending Reliant away would cause the Genesis effect to form in the other direction.

 

[Timo]

I don't think there is any evidence of impulse movement for the wounded ships - impulse is a powerful space drive, better than today's rockets at the very least, yet these ships crawl around at walking pace. The propulsion available to our heroes explicitly is irrelevant to the distress, as Sulu gives his expert opinion on that.

(Beaming would also lack the range to put either the heroes or the Genesis device sufficiently distant, unless it can do interplanetary distances - and usually it cannot, and here it is hobbled by the nebula and possible power shortage or damage issues.)

"Dodging" Genesis by going in a particular direction doesn't sound plausible, or that would have been suggested and implemented. The rings follow the heroes' flight path exactly - an incredible coincidence unless the heroes were the reason for the rings, their warp drive compressing the nebula or whatnot. Any relation to the Genesis effect is speculative, really.

FWIW, Genesis results in a planet at an unknown location. We may assume it's the dead center of the detonation, but we don't have to. For all we know, Genesis does what it was programmed to do ("I don't think there's another piece of information we could squeeze into the memory banks"), transforming a preexisting planet. Which means that aiming is irrelevant or Genesis wouldn't hit that planet.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[J.T.B.]

...The obvious scenario here: two paramedics rush to start work on an accident site. Just before arriving at the coordinates indicated by their navigation computer, they notice a sharp left turn where the map indicates a fairly shallow one. Having never been to this part of the town, they don't at first even notice that two buildings have magically changed places, slightly altering the street plan. Do the paramedics a) stop to investigate, b) phone their employer who's technically part of the same overall city organization that ought to keep buildings from wandering off, or c) ignore the apparent error on the map in favor of the hard reality of the situation?

The example is not comparable. The paramedics in the example drove to the right coordinates per their navigational information. What Reliant did would be comparable to the paramedics driving to the wrong address miles away, not knowing it, and being surprised that they were at the wrong building.

Why would the latter be news? Is Starfleet navigation fault-intolerant? Can't the starship acknowledge and compensate for errors made? We know she can - hundreds of thousands of miles is probably half a picosecond at high warp. And planets in Trek can be lightyears out of place, or move fast enough to outpace starships. That's news in the sense that space exploration with starships is news.

Even assuming Starfleet's navigation is so routinely inaccurate that arriving at the wrong planet is not "news," that would be even more reason to double-check the results. If for nothing else than to avoid the waste of effort, not to mention embarrassment, of performing a mission where it did not need to be performed.

 

[Timo]

The paramedics in the example drove to the right coordinates per their navigational information. What Reliant did would be comparable to the paramedics driving to the wrong address miles away, not knowing it, and being surprised that they were at the wrong building.

Quite the opposite, in fact. The paramedics drove to the exact right place as far as their short range sensors (eyes) told them - they followed the road. They ignored a discrepancy between reality and their "faulty" map. But the error was minuscule, compared to the capabilities of their vehicle and their sensors - exactly as in the Star Trek case.

If for nothing else than to avoid the waste of effort, not to mention embarrassment, of performing a mission where it did not need to be performed.

But it is the short range sensors that tell the truth where records at best quote irrelevancies. A mission might fail to be accomplished if the ship went where a planet "ought" to be, but it won't fail if the ship sails to the planet she can see.

Getting to the exact right spatial coordinates is an unlikely mission, as there's nothing special about a given set of coordinates over any other - except if there's something there, and that will be revealed by a look around, not by adherence to coordinates.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Spot261]

The paramedic example is really not helpful, trust me I've done the job, closer would be walking into an building full of unknown potential dangers and simply heading straight to the first injured person whose injuries in no way resembled those reported without performing more careful checks for your own safety or making sure you hadn't in fact missed someone more urgent. It happens and people die, which is exactly why assessing situations thoroughly is such a major part of their training. This was an error by the reliant crew, there really is no way around it. I get the point about being goal focused but no service would train their personnel to put an "eyes on the prize" mentality before their safety. It did in fact cost them their lives because paying just a bit more attention on approach would have led them to realise there was a huge discrepancy and therefore take stock and reassess. In that case they should have put the disappearance of a planet before their immediate, non time critical mission precisely because it represented a huge and potentially dangerous unknown. Even if we disregard the opportunity this would have given chekov to realise the danger due to khan and speak up it would simply have been good practice. In reality though it did cost their lives, khan may have been an unknown but unknowns are exactly the reason they are trained to exercise caution. They didn't, they just beamed in and died as a result.
I actually accept that their actions pretty much played out as you postulate, in no small part due to the boring nature of their assignment. What I don't accept is that that behaviour can be described as either professional or in any consistent with what we have seen of starfleets operating procedures elsewhere. They really aren't sloppy enough to just land on entirely the wrong planet unless we accept either bad writing or a tired, disinterested crew acting negligently. Ad noted above, if such things were as likely as you suggest, they really ought to be putting more failsafes in place and making more careful checks of their navigational data.
On a slightly lighter note, do you actually know someone who's accidentally found themselves in the wrong European City? I've been driving round Europe for twenty years with and without sat nav and never once have I ever been in a situation which even looked like going that way, nor have I met anyone else who has reported doing so. Send my regards to whoever it was for cheering my day no end though!

 

[B.J.]

It is possible for CA5 to end up where CA6 was supposed to be at certain points in its orbit, assuming the blast from CA6 hit it hard enough. Other orbital parameters like its speed wouldn't match, but there would at least be a planet in the location where you're looking for one. If they'd shown up a month earlier or later, they'd likely be asking more questions since it wouldn't be where they'd expect it to be. But even so, their mission was simply to look for a dead planet, and they (mostly) found one. Figuring out how it got there (if they even noticed after a while) would be secondary.

 

[Nebusj]

The paramedic example is really not helpful, trust me I've done the job, closer would be walking into an building full of unknown potential dangers and simply heading straight to the first injured person whose injuries in no way resembled those reported without performing more careful checks for your own safety or making sure you hadn't in fact missed someone more urgent. It happens and people die, which is exactly why assessing situations thoroughly is such a major part of their training.

So ... if a paramedic were called in to aid the person unconscious and bleeding in front of the green house at 131 Clementi Road, and got there to find a person unconscious and bleeding in front of a red house at 131 Clementi Road, the paramedic would stop and refuse to approach the unconscious and bleeding person until this discrepancy of a reported-green-but-actually-red house was straightened out?

I generically approve of diligence and careful fact-checking. But this does seem like a curious priority.