Nothing about Cochrane's first warp flight makes sense.

[Xerxes1979]

Was he a theoretical physicist? Was he an applied engineer or project manager?

Who did he report to? Who paid his salary and those of his team?

Why would an unproven technology be tried with a manned vessel first?!


How did he expect to become wealthy if the federal government which was his most likely customer had more or less collapsed? That same government would be necessary to enforce patent royalties assuming he truly invented the warp field generator.

If the Phoenix project was a private endeavor where the representatives of the investors? Could wealthy corporations survive on the scale necessary in the aftermath of World War III to fund such a large gamble?

What return on investment did the warp project offer? Traveling to uncharted stars guaranteed nothing. The only sure money in the solar system is mining precious and rare metals from asteroids. If a mining corporation was in control why didn't they meet the Vulcans instead of Cochrane?

 

[C.E. Evans]

One could ask why go anywhere?

 

[bbailey861]

Was he a theoretical physicist? Was he an applied engineer or project manager?

Yes.

Who did he report to? Who paid his salary and those of his team?

Lily.

Why would an unproven technology be tried with a manned vessel first?!

Cochrane was an obsessed daredevil.

How did he expect to become wealthy if the federal government which was his most likely customer had more or less collapsed? That same government would be necessary to enforce patent royalties assuming he truly invented the warp field generator.

He didn't. He just wanted to build the ship to prove his theory. It was Lily's vast resources, squirreled away by her family beofre WW3 that allowed it to happen.

If the Phoenix project was a private endeavor where the representatives of the investors? Could wealthy corporations survive on the scale necessary in the aftermath of World War III to fund such a large gamble?

Again, Lily. And maybe descendants of Raymond Reddington, as well. Unfortunately, all those scenes were cut from the film and all known traces of the script have since disappeared.

What return on investment did the warp project offer? Traveling to uncharted stars guaranteed nothing. The only sure money in the solar system is mining precious and rare metals from asteroids. If a mining corporation was in control why didn't they meet the Vulcans instead of Cochrane?

The "mining precious and rare metals from asteroids" theory is quite likely what Lily had in mind, but sadly, the interference by everyone from the future, and the Vulcan First Contact, thwarted all her nefarious plans. It's really too bad that we'll never know...

 

[Timo]

Was he a theoretical physicist? Was he an applied engineer or project manager?

Might have been the designated test pilot for all we know. But flying a rocket need not be rocket science, so pretty much everything is possible. What Cochrane decidedly is is what's left of the original team. Or then he just grabbed the project from the hands of its deceased originators.

Who did he report to? Who paid his salary and those of his team?

Probably nobody - which explains why it took an extra ten years to finish the project.

Why would an unproven technology be tried with a manned vessel first?!

Who says this was the first test? History records this as the first test the "just passing by" Vulcans observed; might be Cochrane or the team he was part of had done dozens of tests already, before this first flight of the full-sized rig.

But if the flight were (re?)designed to be conducted in the postwar environment, crewing makes sense. There would be few or no support spacecraft available to monitor the test from afar, or to recover or otherwise secure the hardware after the flight. Or if there were any, they would be likely to be "enemy" units Cochrane would wish to personally keep away from his fountain of wealth.

How did he expect to become wealthy if the federal government which was his most likely customer had more or less collapsed?

By selling to whoever had grabbed all that money. Losing one customer would not be a problem, as there would be a queue out there. And no busybody authorities to shoo away the most promising customers!

That same government would be necessary to enforce patent royalties assuming he truly invented the warp field generator.

Neither of those is a requirement. He controls the only working piece of FTL machinery on the planet; he can sell it to the highest bidder for a single fantastic lump sum and then retire, quite regardless of whether he even understands how the machine works.

If the Phoenix project was a private endeavor where the representatives of the investors?

Well, the Phoenix had passenger seats! For all we know, the representatives had withdrawn or died long ago, and the project was running on different assumptions now. Or then the Borg killed the passengers the previous night.

Could wealthy corporations survive on the scale necessary in the aftermath of World War III to fund such a large gamble?

Why not? But the project had apparently already been completed prewar, save for actually putting the finishing touches in the test rig. All they would need is a lump sum to pay to Cochrane. (Or an armed spacecraft to wrestle the machine out of Cochrane's hands, assuming he didn't have scuttling charges in place.)

What return on investment did the warp project offer? Traveling to uncharted stars guaranteed nothing.

Traveling seldom does. Doesn't mean it doesn't pay off in most cases. And many on Earth would already know there are aliens out there worth contacting, for sheer survival if not for get-rich schemes.

The only sure money in the solar system is mining precious and rare metals from asteroids.

Or the moons of the outer planets, say. We know humans had access to those before the war; having warp for getting back there, and getting back from there, would be a huge advantage.

Of course, there's also money to be made from sheer space control. We saw that orbital bombardment was no longer a viable threat as of 2063. But it might soon become one again, and one would want to have superior spacecraft then.

If a mining corporation was in control why didn't they meet the Vulcans instead of Cochrane?

Vulcans weren't interested in humans (which is bullshit on the surface - nobody just "passes through" a star system unless that system is their specific target of interest - but probably close to the truth anyway). A few sublight miners would not be contacted: after all, Vulcans didn't say hello to Neil Armstrong, either, despite having been here at least since 1957.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[enterprisecvn65]

I think the premise that a guy who apparently lives in primitive conditions could build something as complex as warp engines and strap them to an old ICBM and make it the first faster than light vessel has to be taken with a grain of salt.

 

[xvicente]

I think the premise that a guy who apparently lives in primitive conditions could build something as complex as warp engines and strap them to an old ICBM and make it the first faster than light vessel has to be taken with a grain of salt.

grain of salt the size of Fesarius

 

[Richard Baker]

I wondered how did the Phoenix land? Did he separate from the warp section and parachute in? How does the next flight work?- send up another command module and reattach the drive of build another craft entirely.

 

[Turd Ferguson]

What return on investment did the warp project offer? Traveling to uncharted stars guaranteed nothing. The only sure money in the solar system is mining precious and rare metals from asteroids. If a mining corporation was in control why didn't they meet the Vulcans instead of Cochrane?

Nothing was guaranteed until the Vulcans set down in Montana. But, as with any business, once that Vulcan ship set down, their eyes were replaced by dollar signs, because their consumer base probably (at the very least), just doubled or tripled. Because who knows if Vulcans have the equivalent of Budweiser or Nokia on their planet? At that point they could throw millions or billions at Cochrane and recoup it fairly easily. If there's at least one inhabited Class M planet nearby that can detect warp signatures, then there's most likely a few more.

Obviously it did prove profitable for them because within the next ninety years, they were still throwing money at him to get that damn warp five engine built.

 

[Mytran]

I think the premise that a guy who apparently lives in primitive conditions could build something as complex as warp engines and strap them to an old ICBM and make it the first faster than light vessel has to be taken with a grain of salt.

We are of course assuming that Cochrane actually built functional nacelles in the same manner as their 24th century counterparts. However, the only people who bandied around the term "warp" were the crew from the Enterprise - neither Lily nor Cochrane ever described the Phoenix as a "warp ship" and I think there's a good reason for that:

It was not a "Warp" ship

It was certainly a FTL ship and 24th century vocabulary has a tendency to lump all forms of FTL travel into the convenient catch-all term "warp". However, I think what Zefram Cochrane actually invented was more akin to Cary L Brown's "subspace assisted impulse". Basically, a ship projects a subspace field around itself, lowering its apparent mass (DS9 did this in episode 1. Also see "subspace driver coil" in the TNG-tech manual). Conventional thrust engines can then propel the ship at enormous speeds using almost no fuel, since the ship "weighs" less.

All Cochrane did (IMO) was use pre-existing technologies in a new way:

• We know from Space Seed that significant advancements were made in sublight travel by 2018 (Impulse Drive? Subspace displacement field?)
• We know that an ICBM missile lacks enough juice to power a conventional warp drive (although it could power something else)
• And we know that strains credibility beyond breaking point to think that a man in a shack in the woods could both invent and build modern warp drive without significant external support.

My proposal avoids all these issues. Cochrane becomes an insightful tinker who simply combines extant technology in a new and original way and later finds himself flung into the spotlight of greatness.

As for Zephram Cochrane being "the discoverer of the Space Warp" as spoken by James T Kirk in Metamorphosis, this still holds. And there is plenty of time for him to lead a team of specialists in uncovering the basics of 24th century warp drive (AKA the Warp Five Project)

 

[T'Girl]

Why would an unproven technology be tried with a manned vessel first

There might easily have been one or more unmanned flights prior to the first crewed flight.

History places more glory on the first manned moon landing than it does the first soft landing of a probe.

The "first warp flight" is the manned one, and not Cochrane's several instrument packages that went FTL.

 

[Leviathan]

It is totally implausible that a couple guys working in a small shop could realize and then personally test fly a totally new form of transportation.

Again.

Like they did on December 17 1903.

 

[enterprisecvn65]

It is totally implausible that a couple guys working in a small shop could realize and then personally test fly a totally new form of transportation.

Again.

Like they did on December 17 1903.

Hate to point out the slight gap in the amount of technology, materials and working conditions one would have to have access to in order to build a faster than light spacecraft vs a vehicle that flew a few hundred feet powered.

I could counter your Wright Brothers example that in order to create the first nuclear powered vessel, the USS Nautilus, it took the efforts of thousands of men to design and build it. It took several years and cost hundreds of millions of dollars in today's money and had to use the most advanced materials and facilities at the time in order for it to be done.

Creating a faster than light ship would make building the Nautilus look like Legos by comparison. Your Wright Brothers analogy is just a little off the mark given the magnitude of what they were doing in FC.

 

[Ithekro]

We might think that now. Give us another 40 years and check again.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

The USA was one of the governments which survived World War 3, so perhaps they paid Cochrane. Indeed, somebody must have, because he freely admitted he did the whole thing FOR the money...

 

[enterprisecvn65]

We might think that now. Give us another 40 years and check again.

Are you seriously saying that we might be significantly closer to traveling at the speed of light in 40 years than we are now?

I hate to burst your bubble but a majority of scientists who study this kind of thing don't believe that it will EVER be possibly for humans to travel at that speed and I seriously doubt that you could find even ONE qualified expert that would say it will happen in 40 years.

Here's a little perspective:

The fastest straight airplane ever built, the SR-71, could do about 2,200 MPH. It was first flew in 1964

The fastest a human has traveled in a strictly earth bound vehicle is 4,500 MPH in the X-15 rocket plane. That first flew in 1959.

The fastest speed a human has ever achieved is slightly under 25,000 MPH on one of the Apollo missions in 1969.

The fastest speed any man made object has ever achieved is the Helios space probe which hit about 157,000 MPH in 1976.

So the fastest plane record was achieved in a plane that first flew 51 years ago.

The fastest earth vehicle record was in a craft that flew 56 years ago.

The fastest total speed record for a human has stood for 46 years.

The fastest speed for any man made object has stood for 39 years.

It would take a breakthrough that would be immensely greater than anything man has ever achieved to come anywhere the speed of light. Given all the technological advances of the past 30 years, the fact these 4 speed records are still unbroken speaks volumes about how much of a wall we've hit in attempts to break new speed barriers.

Also the helios craft topped out at 157,000 mph. Light travels at 186,000 miles A SECOND. So in the time the Helios covered it's distance in an hour, a ray of light had traveled 669,600,000 miles.

So in 40 years we would have to come up with a way to create a craft that would be 42,639 times faster than anything we've done.

Given the fact we haven't created a faster plane in over 50 years than the SR-71.....the chances of making a craft that much faster than what currently exists are basically zero.

If the first person who built a floating boat was able to parlay that into building a modern nuclear powered aircraft carrier in a year.....that accomplishment would still pale by comparison to the challenge of man building a faster than light craft 40 years from now. And I say that with total seriousness.

I'm sure amazing things will be created in the next 40 years, but light speed travel or anything close won't be one of them. The odds are also greatly against it ever happening at all.

 

[Firebird]

We might think that now. Give us another 40 years and check again.

Are you seriously saying that we might be significantly closer to traveling at the speed of light in 40 years than we are now?

I hate to burst your bubble but a majority of scientists who study this kind of thing don't believe that it will EVER be possibly for humans to travel at that speed and I seriously doubt that you could find even ONE qualified expert that would say it will happen in 40 years.

Here's a little perspective:

The fastest straight airplane ever built, the SR-71, could do about 2,200 MPH. It was first flew in 1964

The fastest a human has traveled in a strictly earth bound vehicle is 4,500 MPH in the X-15 rocket plane. That first flew in 1959.

The fastest speed a human has ever achieved is slightly under 25,000 MPH on one of the Apollo missions in 1969.

The fastest speed any man made object has ever achieved is the Helios space probe which hit about 157,000 MPH in 1976.

So the fastest plane record was achieved in a plane that first flew 51 years ago.

The fastest earth vehicle record was in a craft that flew 56 years ago.

The fastest total speed record for a human has stood for 46 years.

The fastest speed for any man made object has stood for 39 years.

It would take a breakthrough that would be immensely greater than anything man has ever achieved to come anywhere the speed of light. Given all the technological advances of the past 30 years, the fact these 4 speed records are still unbroken speaks volumes about how much of a wall we've hit in attempts to break new speed barriers.

Also the helios craft topped out at 157,000 mph. Light travels at 186,000 miles A SECOND. So in the time the Helios covered it's distance in an hour, a ray of light had traveled 669,600,000 miles.

So in 40 years we would have to come up with a way to create a craft that would be 42,639 times faster than anything we've done.

Given the fact we haven't created a faster plane in over 50 years than the SR-71.....the chances of making a craft that much faster than what currently exists are basically zero.

If the first person who built a floating boat was able to parlay that into building a modern nuclear powered aircraft carrier in a year.....that accomplishment would still pale by comparison to the challenge of man building a faster than light craft 40 years from now. And I say that with total seriousness.

I'm sure amazing things will be created in the next 40 years, but light speed travel or anything close won't be one of them. The odds are also greatly against it ever happening at all.

Given that, the Earth of Star Trek's universe was able to launch a ship like the Botany Bay, with fully functioning cryogenic facilities, into deep space in 1996 should illustrate the technological differences between the real world and this fictional world. The technological capabilities of Earth in Chochrane's time could therefore be adequate to explain warp drive being invented then.

TL;DR - you can't wholly apply real-world technical achievements to Star Trek's.

 

[Mudd]

The OP is right. None of it made much sense if you look past the immediate plot.

 

[Leviathan]

It is totally implausible that a couple guys working in a small shop could realize and then personally test fly a totally new form of transportation.

Again.

Like they did on December 17 1903.

Hate to point out the slight gap in the amount of technology, materials and working conditions one would have to have access to in order to build a faster than light spacecraft vs a vehicle that flew a few hundred feet powered.

I could counter your Wright Brothers example that in order to create the first nuclear powered vessel, the USS Nautilus, it took the efforts of thousands of men to design and build it. It took several years and cost hundreds of millions of dollars in today's money and had to use the most advanced materials and facilities at the time in order for it to be done.

Creating a faster than light ship would make building the Nautilus look like Legos by comparison. Your Wright Brothers analogy is just a little off the mark given the magnitude of what they were doing in FC.

Wait, you mean that ship whose design, funding, and construction, and teams of contractors was all coordinated by Hyman Rickover "The Father of the Nuclear Navy"?

...same guy that was aboard the initial naval sea trial of every nuclear design for more than 20 years?

He's a terrible analogy for Cochrane organizing a team and creating a new form of transportation he personally tested.

Having never built a warp ship I don't know if it's a bit of innovation a team could pull off in 10 years or a million man years. My point is that great technical leaps are often focussed by one person who is rigorously involved in all elements - including the first launch.

 

[UssGlenn]

I wondered how did the Phoenix land? Did he separate from the warp section and parachute in? How does the next flight work?- send up another command module and reattach the drive of build another craft entirely.

I've been mulling this one over for years. SpaceX finally gave me the solution. In the movie, we never see the large rocket on the base of the Phoenix fire. But it has to serve some purpose. Therefore, I believe the Phoenix lands like the Grasshopper rocket, making it fully reusable.

 

[Mytran]

Ah, not unlike the SP.E.C.T.R.E. rocket in You Only Live Twice, with the unparalleled accuracy of Thunderbird 3?

Then again, there may have been plenty of oribtal craft to assist. With the improvements in interplanetary travel in 2018 as told by Space Seed (supported by One Small Step where stranded astronauts on Mars had only to wait weeks for a rescue instead of months or years) then there would likely still be a reasonable amount of traffic flying around the solar system. I'm sure one of the cargo freighters would have given Cochrane a ride down.