Should the Burn Have Been Worse?

[Dryson]

We might not know the extent of the damage caused by the Burn until Starfleet starts sending missions to stations and bases that were operated by Starfleet before the Burn.

Then there would be the starship wrecks that Starfleet will come across for many years, unless a salvage mission is started to search for them.

 

[DEWLine]

They inverted le Guin's premise here: by easing Su'Kal's suffering, they've ended or at worst greatly reduced the chance of a second "Burn" and started the process of healing (and improving) their own societies.

 

[Dryson]

We don't even know how bad the Burn actually was yet, except for the mess around Osyrra's junk planet, which I would assume is very much the same for the rest of the galaxy.

 

[F. King Daniel]

We don't even know how bad the Burn actually was yet, except for the mess around Osyrra's junk planet, which I would assume is very much the same for the rest of the galaxy.

Every active warp core in the galaxy exploded all at once. That's like if every running car on earth exploded at once. And nobody knew what caused it so nobody knew driving was safe in case it happened again.

That's pretty bad.

 

[fireproof78]

Every active warp core in the galaxy exploded all at once. That's like if every running car on earth exploded at once. And nobody knew what caused it so nobody knew driving was safe in case it happened again.

That's pretty bad.

Nah. It will buff right out.

 

[Deks]

Every active warp core in the galaxy exploded all at once. That's like if every running car on earth exploded at once. And nobody knew what caused it so nobody knew driving was safe in case it happened again.

That's pretty bad.

And yet, we still saw ships flying at warp etc.
Both the Emerald Chain and Starfleet had various ships in operation.

And despite every ship with an active warp core in the galaxy going up in flames... there's still TW beaming which has amazingly large range, and can easily shuffle people wherever they need to go.
In essence, the means of transport would maybe undergo a change where TW beaming is the primary method of going about with ships being used very sparingly in case of another Burn.
But moving supplies and resources via TW beaming would be dead simple... so the Federation (while still impacted by the Burn) would effectively BYPASS its overall effects and not have to break up in the first place.

 

[F. King Daniel]

And yet, we still saw ships flying at warp etc.
Both the Emerald Chain and Starfleet had various ships in operation.

And despite every ship with an active warp core in the galaxy going up in flames... there's still TW beaming which has amazingly large range, and can easily shuffle people wherever they need to go.
In essence, the means of transport would maybe undergo a change where TW beaming is the primary method of going about with ships being used very sparingly in case of another Burn.
But moving supplies and resources via TW beaming would be dead simple... so the Federation (while still impacted by the Burn) would effectively BYPASS its overall effects and not have to break up in the first place.

Apparently there is no transwarp beaming. It's a plothole, I was sure in the first episode Book was beaming from world to world but apparently not. Perhaps it was a technology erased in the Temporal Wars

 

[fireproof78]

Apparently there is no transwarp beaming. It's a plothole, I was sure in the first episode Book was beaming from world to world but apparently not. Perhaps it was a technology erased in the Temporal Wars

I think its tech that was protected to prevent infiltration.

 

[the Sisko]

Episode 2 showed that worlds were devasted too. Any word that had dilithium powered anything (industrial replicators, parked ships, artificial habitats, minable dilithium) saw explosions too, some that could have been large enough to cause environmental disasters. In addition to the explosions, they found they were alone with they needed help (like to replace the replicators and corresponding food, to deal with the death count or to evacuate a no-longer viable world).

 

[F. King Daniel]

Episode 2 showed that worlds were devasted too. Any word that had dilithium powered anything (industrial replicators, parked ships, artificial habitats, minable dilithium) saw explosions too, some that could have been large enough to cause environmental disasters. In addition to the explosions, they found they were alone with they needed help (like to replace the replicators and corresponding food, to deal with the death count or to evacuate a no-longer viable world).

Surely orbiting ships would have caused catastrophic damage to planets?

 

[eschaton]

Surely orbiting ships would have caused catastrophic damage to planets?

I dunno about Trek logic, but in the real world? Probably not. Things would blow up to smithereens, and the dust/debris would either remain in orbit, or harmlessly burn up in the atmosphere. Unless for some reason entire starbases fell to the ground intact, I would think the damage would be relatively minor - both because orbital areas are not that crowded in-universe, and 99%+ of land area wouldn't be major cities.

I've actually read quite a bit about how orbital debris could basically end a space program, insofar as once there's enough space junk in orbit it because next-to-impossible to stop something from hitting you at very high (orbital) speeds when ascending into space. Of course, the Trekverse has shields, so this might not be a big issue.

 

[F. King Daniel]

I dunno about Trek logic, but in the real world? Probably not. Things would blow up to smithereens, and the dust/debris would either remain in orbit, or harmlessly burn up in the atmosphere. Unless for some reason entire starbases fell to the ground intact, I would think the damage would be relatively minor - both because orbital areas are not that crowded in-universe, and 99%+ of land area wouldn't be major cities.

I've actually read quite a bit about how orbital debris could basically end a space program, insofar as once there's enough space junk in orbit it because next-to-impossible to stop something from hitting you at very high (orbital) speeds when ascending into space. Of course, the Trekverse has shields, so this might not be a big issue.

Warp core explosions in Trek are inconsistent, but more often than not they massive. That said, the Enterprise-D blew up in orbit of Veridian III and those millions of unseen people were presumably fine.

 

[137th Gebirg]

Wasn't there a line from Book, early on in the season, where the effects "spanned galaxIES" or something like that, as in multiple? That could easily imply the death of Trillions, not just millions. It also implied that the Federation, or whatever it became, spanned multiple galaxies enough to know that they were all affected as well, that far away. It seemed they quietly rolled-back the scope of the problem once someone in the writers' room realized, "how do we really know it went out that far?" It wound up being a throw-away line to ramp-up the drama and jeopardy that we were supposed to forget about instead.

As for the cause of the Burn? I remember reading a multitude of fan theories on this BBS that were orders of magnitude more interesting than the simple child's temper tantrum in a dilithium field that it eventually wound up being. I'll give them some credit, though... At least it didn't have something to do with Burnham, as some folks thought during the start of the last season.

Love your updated avatar, BTW, @F. King Daniel - Very timely!

 

[eschaton]

Warp core explosions in Trek are inconsistent, but more often than not they massive. That said, the Enterprise-D blew up in orbit of Veridian III and those millions of unseen people were presumably fine.

I guess the real question is if warp core explosions release any sort of radiation which can penetrate a planetary atmosphere from say 20-100 miles up? I would guess not, given lots of ships have blown up in Trek when "hero ships" are way, way closer than that, with no hint of deadly radiation. Obviously there are shields, but I can't see them being orders of magnitude better than miles of atmosphere/magnetic fields.

 

[fireproof78]

So, heavy radiation from the explosion, primarily gamma rays. It's a short term exposure, but rather intense.

But, that's my basic college level physics understanding.

 

[GothicPudding]

Warp core explosions in Trek are inconsistent, but more often than not they massive. That said, the Enterprise-D blew up in orbit of Veridian III and those millions of unseen people were presumably fine.

Veridian III, where the Enterprise-D exploded in orbit, was uninhabited. Veridian IV was the inhabited planet in the system.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Veridian III, where the Enterprise-D exploded in orbit, was uninhabited. Veridian IV was the inhabited planet in the system.

Ah, I stand corrected. Been awhile since I saw Generations.

 

[Amasov]

I don't know that it should have been "worse," but rather feeding my own curiosity in that I wanted to know what the extent of it was beyond what we saw.

When Discovery is finally folded into Starfleet, I had been hoping that when Vance mentioned they were his only first responder, that he would send them out to various starbases and planets they lost contact with to assess and restore communication with them. The crew of Discovery was in the same exact position we, the viewers, were.

 

[fireproof78]

I still hope they are that rapid response unit and expand its role in to exploration. And possibly become controversial due to their spore drive. Please be controversial because of the spore drive.

 

[Amasov]

I still hope they are that rapid response unit and expand its role in to exploration. And possibly become controversial due to their spore drive. Please be controversial because of the spore drive.

That's also my hope for next season. I think that's where some significant world-building can be done.