The Romulan Supernova: The final, canon word

[F. King Daniel]

Nero even describes his ship as a simple mining vessel, not 'a simple mining vessel that's been given Borg enhancements to make it super-huge.'

Spock says the supernova threatened to destroy the galaxy but now it didn't. If they want to reference Nero launching from the Romulan cube with loads of Borg tech 20 years ago, they will.

I doubt it, but the point is: Nothing is sacred, everything can be overwritten and changed.

 

[Timo]

There's the road of minimum resistance, though. Nothing wrong with a bit of hyperbole in a statement. But pseudo-facts about schedules and physical things are less malleable.

Some, like John Lennon, like to think that everything is true until stated otherwise. Some won't stop even at that. But while I like houses of cards as much as the next vice president, I don't want to have my "everything" defined by merchandising that so far has consistently been shown to be far more contradictable than the smallest onscreen stuff. Why make things difficult by worrying about Borg Enhancements or Mourning Tattoos when there are none?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Reverend]

Here's a fun and oddly relevant to this discussion video that just came out: -

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Main take-away: I was right in that the main threat of a supernova isn't the physical blast wave of expanding stellar matter, it's the initial burst of radiation. What I got wrong was what kind of radiation; not gamma but neutrino. Yes, there'd be gamma too of course, but this kind of of amplified neutrino burst sounds waaaaaay worse. Like everyone on the planet (and I mean *everyone*; both sides!) vaporising in a fraction of a second, mere light minutes after the core collapse reaches critical.
Even with fictional FTL sensing and communication, the level of notice you're liable to get that the star is going to explode is measured in *minutes*. And if that's something you know is going to happen at literally any moment in the next few years, then yeah, I'd call that a matter or urgency!

And before anyone chimes in about energy shields or the like, note that the order of magnitude of energy being released is roughly analogous to throwing an antimatter bomb the size of Jupiter...at Jupiter. In Trek terms that's like saying literally every single anti-matter warhead in the entire galaxy (Federation, Klingon, Romulan, Dominion, Borg, Pakleds...everyone!) all hitting the same shield, all at once. No shield we've ever seen in Trek have been able to take more than a few dozen anti-matter hits before consoles start exploding and percentages in single digits start getting yelled about.

Given the sheer magnitude of the energy release, it's a fair bet that these effects don't abate much within the first few light years of ground zero (stellar zero?) So yeah, within the next decade or ten, every life supporting planet in the locality is going to have a *really* bad day. And it's not like people can all just pile into ships of shelters and wait it out, because the planets themselves would be well and truly sterilised. No biome or order of life would be spared from mega fauna and flora down to microbiota.

 

[Timo]

Well, we saw what this wave of hurt did to a planet: it tore apart the physical structure, not in a flash, but in a push sustained for at least several seconds. This does not appear an unlikely result within the system whose star blows. But farther out, some sort of a radiation front would obviously be the real problem, even if only after a few years and with precise advance warning on when it arrives.

Yet in Trek and reality alike, the statistics must be considered: total devastation doesn't cover sizable parts of the galaxy, or Earth would have been sterilized several times over by now. What is the real lethal range of a neutrino burst? That is, in terms of inverse square, if the magnitude of the explosion isn't a major factor?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[SG-17]

IIRC neutrinos don't interact with normal matter, so the neutrino burst wouldn't do anything to anyone.

 

[Yistaan]

Spock's red matter operation is almost definitely now an underground unsanctioned by the Federation project despite the Jellyfish being commissioned by the Vulcan Science Academy. Otherwise the Admiral would have told Picard, "We didn't abandon the Romulans, we just changed our plans to have Spock use red matter to stop the supernova, and you can't blame us for that failing."

 

[Jedman67]

IIRC neutrinos don't interact with normal matter, so the neutrino burst wouldn't do anything to anyone.

A supernova-type neutrino burst would sterilize earth in seconds. The shockwave would, if not tear the earth apart, would strip the atmosphere and part of the surface of the planet.

Of course, star trek technology could create supernova-proof shields if it could invent a material that creates black holes out of nothing.

 

[fireproof78]

Spock's red matter operation is almost definitely now an underground unsanctioned by the Federation project despite the Jellyfish being commissioned by the Vulcan Science Academy.

Which fits in with what I thought was implied by Spock's statements to Kirk in ST 09.

 

[SG-17]

A supernova-type neutrino burst would sterilize earth in seconds. The shockwave would, if not tear the earth apart, would strip the atmosphere and part of the surface of the planet.

Of course, star trek technology could create supernova-proof shields if it could invent a material that creates black holes out of nothing.

How would the neutrino burst do this if the neutrinos pass harmlessly through ordinary matter?

 

[Reverend]

Well, we saw what this wave of hurt did to a planet: it tore apart the physical structure, not in a flash, but in a push sustained for at least several seconds. This does not appear an unlikely result within the system whose star blows. But farther out, some sort of a radiation front would obviously be the real problem, even if only after a few years and with precise advance warning on when it arrives.

That would be the (much slower) physical blast wave of expanding stellar matter. the thing is, by that point planet that's being torn and blast apart is already a sterile rock.

A neutrino/gamma burst travels at light speed and in accordance with the laws of thermodynaics probably reaches a LOT farther out than the much slower moving ejected matter.

Yet in Trek and reality alike, the statistics must be considered: total devastation doesn't cover sizable parts of the galaxy, or Earth would have been sterilized several times over by now. What is the real lethal range of a neutrino burst? That is, in terms of inverse square, if the magnitude of the explosion isn't a major factor?

Timo Saloniemi

I didn't say it would cover a sizable chunk of the galaxy, but the radiation burst would sterilise every system within a few dozen light-years of Romulus. Given how centralised power, authority, information, and general logistics tend to be in an empire, that's a mortal blow to one of the Alpha/Beta quadrant's three main powers. Literally cutting it's heart out.

The evacuation effort alone would be crippling since aside from all of the disruption of personnel, the near total commitment of resources, the imperial fleet is likely stretched beyond the breaking point, so good luck holding onto planets that don't want to be under imperial authority anymore.
Add to that the refugee crisis and utter chaos that such a colossal power vacuum would cause; yeah, I'd call that a threat to all of the known galaxy. At least, to all intents and purposes from the Federation's POV.

IIRC neutrinos don't interact with normal matter, so the neutrino burst wouldn't do anything to anyone.

Watch the video, Kyle explains the science a lot better than I could. Short version: neutrinos DO interact with matter (how else could we detect them) but only just barely. However the sheer number of them created by a supernova is so mindbogglingly huge that they'd deliver a lethal dose of radiation to everything on Earth with in 1/20th of a second...then spend the rest of that second reducing it all to ash.

Rough analogy: nominal background neutrino radiation (the kind that's passing though us all right now like a ghostly blizzard of particles) is like getting a single drop of rain falling on your head once every 78 years. During a supernova, it's like the entire Atlantic ocean gets dump directly on your head, all at once. Squish.

 

[Noname Given]

Spock's red matter operation is almost definitely now an underground unsanctioned by the Federation project despite the Jellyfish being commissioned by the Vulcan Science Academy. Otherwise the Admiral would have told Picard, "We didn't abandon the Romulans, we just changed our plans to have Spock use red matter to stop the supernova, and you can't blame us for that failing."

Why would she reveal ANYTHING to a now retired Admiral (who no longer has any security clearances), and probably resigned before the Red Matter plan was approved?
^^
Especially since he resigned in protest, and admitted publicly in an interview just one to two days previous that he fells: "Star Fleet ISN'T Star Fleet!")

 

[Jedman67]

Rough analogy: nominal background neutrino radiation is like getting a single drop of rain falling on your head once every 78 years. During a supernova, it's like the entire Atlantic ocean gets dump direction on your head, all at once.

Or better, an ocean with the same volume as the sun getting dumped on the entire planet, all at once, within a fraction of a second.
But ya know, radiation instead of water.

 

[Reverend]

Why would she reveal ANYTHING to a now retired Admiral (who no longer has any security clearances), and probably resigned before the Red Matter plan was approved?
^^
Especially since he resigned in protest, and admitted publicly in an interview just one to two days previous that he fells: "Star Fleet ISN'T Star Fleet!")

And that's running on the assumption that Spock's red matter project was even a Federation one. For all we know he'd never left Romulus once between 'Unification' and 'ST'09'. Starfleet could have been entirely in the dark on that and just assumed Spock was lost when Romulus was destroyed.

 

[Yistaan]

Why would she reveal ANYTHING to a now retired Admiral (who no longer has any security clearances), and probably resigned before the Red Matter plan was approved?
^^
Especially since he resigned in protest, and admitted publicly in an interview just one to two days previous that he fells: "Star Fleet ISN'T Star Fleet!")

Fair enough. Although a black hole out of nowhere destroying a supernova isn't something easily hidden, so Picard has to know something about that already.

 

[Noname Given]

Fair enough. Although a black hole out of nowhere destroying a supernova isn't something easily hidden, so Picard has to know something about that already.

Yeah, if anything he watched the aftermath on the Fed Net News like every other Civilian - but I'm sure even they don't know the specifics as to what caused it.

 

[Racefuel]

And that's running on the assumption that Spock's red matter project was even a Federation one. For all we know he'd never left Romulus once between 'Unification' and 'ST'09'. Starfleet could have been entirely in the dark on that and just assumed Spock was lost when Romulus was destroyed.

There's a flashback of Spock with other Vulcans, so either they were on Romulus or he was on Vulcan.

 

[The Overlord]

Given what we learned in episode 2, I could totally see members of the Zhat Vash being fanatical enough to cause the Synth rebellion, even if it destroyed Romulus in the process.

 

[thribs]

This new cabal must have done it. From orders from the Iconians of course.

 

[Timo]

Spock's red matter operation is almost definitely now an underground unsanctioned by the Federation project despite the Jellyfish being commissioned by the Vulcan Science Academy. Otherwise the Admiral would have told Picard, "We didn't abandon the Romulans, we just changed our plans to have Spock use red matter to stop the supernova, and you can't blame us for that failing."

We don't even know if Spock's space scooter was from the VSA. Spock just says "our"; might be the fastest thing in the garage of his manor for all we can tell. Maybe this was a personal obsession of Spock's, the brainchild of a madman, and never was gonna work anyway, thus negating all the objections we have to it.

(What we saw Spock do specifically was stop the wave of death that pulverized Romulus. This wouldn't stop a lightspeed wavefront that would be long past already. That is, unless the resulting black hole expanded at FTL speeds and swallowed the lightspeed front in the process. Spock's and Nero's warp-capable vessels would have little trouble sailing out of a large and shallow black hole; indeed, their confrontation and chase might have happened within it, moments before they were sucked into the timehole part of it close to the singularity.)

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Yistaan]

We don't even know if Spock's space scooter was from the VSA. Spock just says "our"; might be the fastest thing in the garage of his manor for all we can tell. Maybe this was a personal obsession of Spock's, the brainchild of a madman, and never was gonna work anyway, thus negating all the objections we have to it.

(What we saw Spock do specifically was stop the wave of death that pulverized Romulus. This wouldn't stop a lightspeed wavefront that would be long past already. That is, unless the resulting black hole expanded at FTL speeds and swallowed the lightspeed front in the process. Spock's and Nero's warp-capable vessels would have little trouble sailing out of a large and shallow black hole; indeed, their confrontation and chase might have happened within it, moments before they were sucked into the timehole part of it close to the singularity.)

Timo Saloniemi

Kelvin Timeline Spock: Computer, what is your manufacturing origin?
Jellyfish Computer: Stardate twenty-three eighty-seven. Commissioned by the Vulcan Science Academy.