Mister Fandango
Fleet Captain
What surprised me was three parachutes towing a ship that size.
The Last Ship - Discussion Thread (spoilers possible)
- Thread starter Scout101
- Start date
Except TOS Kirk didn't have grey hair either that was the other captains, many of whom dropped like flies, went nuts, or generally just got their asses handed to them.
Sounds like the show that Voyager never became.
Yes, but that Captain Kirk spent most of the series being a womanizing moron, so it's not like you were much better off without the grey-haired...
It's a ship designed for high speed maneuvers and to survive by stealth, which means it doesn't have a lot of heavy armor plate and therefore isn't as heavy as her size would suggest.
Besides, the chutes weren't towing the ship at flank speed. The whole point was just to make enough steerageway to generate a little power and get moving toward sanctuary. And the crew almost died before they got there anyway. Nobody's saying you can always just hook up some chutes anytime and your engine problems are all solved.
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And the point of bashing TOS is...?
Not TOS. I like TOS. I just think Kirk's a womanizing moron.
Who didn't wind up dead or a disgraced due to piss poor judgement like your vaulted older captains.
She is still maybe five times as heavy as the USS Constitution or the USCGC Eagle and you would wonder how three para-sails could have that much pull strength.
Why would a missile recovery chute have a sail anyway instead of a circular chute which would be more efficient. Nobody would be up steering the chute and payload to splash down.
Mister Fandango
Fleet Captain
I'm also pretty sure a couple of parachute cords would snap like twigs if they had the pull strength to tow a ship even half an inch per hour.
That was a good moment in the show. Such a good job conveying feeling with only facial expression. I kind of like his character, I just hope they don't turn him into a womanizing, assholish, stereotypical, thrillseeking type ex-military guy.
I'm not clear on all the parachutes pulling the ship when it comes to physics or how fast the ship would have to move to turn the propellers which intern provides power to the ship. Maybe some Navy guys can offer some insight on that. It seems a bit fantastic but . . . hey . . . I don't know.
And is it me or did it seem like about a third to half of the sailors on the beach where female? In the typical scenes I don't notice nearly as many women on board as in that ending beach party scene. It looked more like a beach filled with college kids (based on the male/female ratio) than anything I would expect a naval ship to have. I would expect 1 out of 5 or one out of 6 at best to be female.
Considering the lack of power to most of the ship . . . were they able to divert power from the generator to the ships coolers (food)? Though I imagine at this point that most of their food has to be non-perishable as to not matter. And if they had I guess they could have placed the virus samples there instead of having to dump it into the ocean.
I was a cruise ship employee for many years. On cruise ships the engines (largest diesels on the planet) only provide electrical power. Part of that in turn is used to run electric motors that turn the props. So, getting the props to turn by wind power would do nothing to provide the ship with power. Not sure if the destroyer is setup the same way.
When he started calling Chandler 'Commodore' within 5 seconds of first appearing on the screen, I thought "Great, this their asshole version of Pope from Falling Skies." Turns out this guy is kind of cool.
Huh? She talked to a shipmate on a crowded beach. Did I miss something? How is that being "with" another guy?
Anyway, another good episode. The characters are all still pretty thin, but they're believable, and there were some good moments. The XO's interrogation and the setup to the chess game were both quite good.
As for the amount of females on the beach... probably just the Rule of Cool when it comes to bikini shots. Maybe a large portion of guys were playing flag football or going on a hike outside offscreen.
The chute-sailing probably made no sense at all in real-world terms, but it didn't bother me much. The important thing is the ep took the ship's plight seriously.
Huh? She talked to a shipmate on a crowded beach. Did I miss something? How is that being "with" another guy?
I thought we saw her leaving with the guy she was talking to? Anyway, the SEAL certainly reacted as though they were together when he saw them, though I guess that could just be him being a bitter and jealous douche.
^ Dude... he wanted to talk to her because she looked glum and lonely. When a shipmate sat by her and started to raise her spirits a bit, he was looked pained that it wasn't him making her smile. That doesn't in of itself make him "bitter" or a "douche", and more than it means she's now getting with their mutual shipmate. Calm down, man.
On an Arleigh Burke the propulsion plant is gas turbines (jet engines) driving the propeller shafts through a reduction gearbox. Electrical systems are powered by a separate gas turbine system not connected to the main propulsion. So, no.
(In the book, written when CGN surface combatants were still a thing, the destroyer was nuclear-powered. She was low on fuel, but was said to have new-generation reactors which could be re-fueled by uranium rods at regular naval bases rather than in a major dockyard project.)
There are definitely "parachutes" currently in use that are used to augment the engine power on much larger cargo ships, so with a smaller ship like an Arleigh Burke it might be able to get it moving from a standing start. They give the cargo ships a couple knots extra speed and save a great deal on fuel costs.
[yt]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LIjBv5bbAM8[/yt]
Excellent! 13 more episodes next summer. And Falling Skies gets a final season 5 to wrap things up.