Collapse of warp field question

[The Grim Ghost]

So I know that if a ship loses warp drive or the warp field collapses, the ship instantly seems to drop out and does not maintain the same speed.

My question is, does the impulse speed a ship is at before warp carry over at all when the ship drops out of warp? Or is it cancelled out somehow?

 

[Christopher]

It stands to reason that a ship would retain its normal-space velocity on coming out of warp. Warp propulsion does not impart acceleration per se, but moves space itself. So it wouldn't alter the ship's momentum or velocity.

 

[John O.]

Often times, though, we're made to believe that the accidental "collapse" of a warp field can be catastrophic (a scene where we actually see it take place is the NX-Beta coming out of Warp 2+ in Enterprise's "First Flight) and the craft literally flew apart.

I imagine that when a ship comes out of warp by mistake because the warp field collapses, it probably collapses asymmetrically, with pockets of space (including completely random, probably fluctuating 3-dimensional pockets of the ship) all in variable-strength/integrity warp fields as it collapses... so individual parts come out of warp with different momenta.

 

[Timo]

I'd also imagine that it is an engineering priority to protect the ships from such a catastrophic, asymmetric field collapse. Thus, the field is actually rigged to collapse fairly easily, so that it can be brought down symmetrically.

This explains why Trek ships don't fight at warp much: the very first exchange of fire can often force the combatants out of warp, because the engines are deliberately designed to quit working before something really bad happens.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[John O.]

Oh yeah I would agree - most of the time when you see signs of some kind of catastrophic field collapse being seriously possible, it's usually because they're up to something sketchy... customizing something, experimenting with something, doing something to systems they weren't designed to do.

 

[Timo]

Also, when a "subspace implosion" cripples a ship that tries too much or is sabotaged or her maintenance is claimed to be neglected ("Naked Time", "Conspiracy"), it's probably intended to signify the catastrophic collapse of her warp fields more than anything else...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[publiusr]

Like cavitation affects a ship--eats into her props.

 

[SicOne]

We see the USS Equinox fall abruptly out of warp in Voyager's "Equinox, Part 2" after two photon torpedoes from Voyager destroy one of her warp nacelles. The ship was in bad shape after that occured, but it appeared to be more from the explosions' effects rather than the shock of dropping out of warp so quickly.

 

[T'Girl]

Equinox was in pretty iffy shape prior to the explosions.

 

[david lowbridge]

A warp field collapse seems to just drop the ship out of warp, I suspect that there is a system that drops it out of warp at the first sign of trouble - enabling the crew to solve the problem rather than be blown out into space, which would put a dampner on the day. In terms of what speed it goes to, looking at the Equinox and other ships coming out of warp, they don't stop instantly so at least some inertia must be maintained or impulse/thrusters. Considering the way the warp field is suppose to work I would suggest the later, that it is the impulse drive maintaining the movement... so that leaves either pilot, original speed from the impulse drive or automatic correction.

I would say the original speed is a little poor, as that would mean ships going from warp X to dead stop, which would contradict the reason behind them carrying on (after all stopping dead in a warp battle could make the other side over shoot and then you run off in another direction, they would have to turn round and then track you, putting more distance between you and them - if that was possible it would be used in ST all the time). Leaving it to the pilot would seem dangerous to me so I would say that an automatic speed is probably the best solution to this.

 

[SicOne]

In "Nemesis", we see the Enterprise-E blown out of warp by the Scimitar and from the banking turn of Scimitar, E-E appears to be at a dead stop.

Contrast that to the controlled transition of Enterprise-A in "The Undiscovered Country" as it comes out of warp but is still going at high speed (well, high speed compared to what we normally see on-screen impulse at...) to Khitomer orbit.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Score another point for my totally harebrained "acceleration" theory, that warp drives and impulse engines do not produce an absolute velocity but an acceleration effect. When the warp field collapses, the ship simply stops accelerating and falls to a "constant speed" relative to the interstellar medium; in Nemesis, this means the ship is stuck coasting through the rift and won't be able to clear it in time to call for help, while the Scimitar can now hover around under impulse power and plink at her with disruptors. This nicely explains why the first ship, dropping suddenly out of warp, is not immediately overshot by the second by tens of millions of kilometers. There's no change in velocity, there's actually a cessation in change of velocity.

One case jumps to mind for this one. In Enterprise' "Future Tense," Archer tells the Suliban "There's a Vulcan ship a few million kilometers from here," at a time when the Enterprise is traveling at maximum warp. Assuming this is about warp five, the ship could be assumed to be traveling a few dozen times the speed of light... and yet, we hear T'pol reading off relative distances, from 600 to 200 thousand kilometers in about ten seconds. If the Tal'Kir is stationary (and it must be, having already been disabled by the Tholians) then the Enterprise is traveling at about 4,000km/s relative to the Vulcan ship (just over 1% of the speed of light). In this case, we can therefore conclude that the Tal'Kir was on an inertial trajectory several million kilometers AHEAD of the Enterprise and the warp engines were simply needed to "catch up" to it on mutual heading. They'd already begun to overtake it, then Archer orders "take us out of warp" and Travis presumably knows to reverse engines and decelerate enough to match Tal'Kir's velocity... where they discover that the Vulcans are in sorry shape and the Tholians are waiting for them.

We'd just have to take this as a sci-fi convenience. Real space ships fly on orbits and trajectories, but nobody ever draws attention to this, even in REALISTIC science fiction where this is explicitly the case.

 

[Timo]

Warp factors as acceleration settings would also immediately remove any and all controversies regarding warp speeds vs. travel times: we could not divine the latter from the former even if we knew the distance, unless we knew the exact acceleration profile (i.e. was the ship at warp 5 already before the camera joined the action), and certainly not the latter from the former.

Also, most warp speed controversies arise with very high speeds over long distances or times. If warp factors were acceleration factors, then it might make perfect sense for warp seven to take you to the center of the galaxy in the same time two bursts of warp nine plus an adventure in between would barely get you to the next star system.

However, warp seems to indicate universal speed in so many chase scenes that it's difficult to accept it as acceleration or a ship-specific variable. Our heroes generally seem to accept that if their opponent flees at warp 8, the way to stay with him is to do warp 8, too - regardless of either party's original state of motion.

Luckily, impulse chases are so rare that "impulse factors" can still easily be regarded as accelerations or throttle settings.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Crazy Eddie]

However, warp seems to indicate universal speed in so many chase scenes that it's difficult to accept it as acceleration or a ship-specific variable. Our heroes generally seem to accept that if their opponent flees at warp 8, the way to stay with him is to do warp 8, too - regardless of either party's original state of motion.

Enough of those chases begin from a similar starting point and along a similar heading that it might not really matter in the end. The ones that do not, it could be assumed, require some un-mentioned (but deftly executed by the helmsman) final maneuvers to bring them to a final interception point.

 

[Timo]

True enough. Warp factors could be universal units of FTL acceleration (not necessarily intuitively clear linear ones, of course), although they're unlikely to be ship-specific throttle settings if two sides to a chase can agree that they're going at warp 5 (even allowing for the Universal Translator).

Timo Saloniemi