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Lord Poe wrote:BTW, Saxton puts the DS1 at the time it had a clear shot at Y4 "on the order of one or two hundred thousand kilometres" away.

Novae can release energy enough to ruin biospheres light-years away.

Illuminatus Primus wrote:What, are all the moons and the planet now Black Hole-level gravity wells with Event Horizons expanding in all directions obscuring the moon such that all gamma rays will just magically swirl away even though there's nothing blocking line-of-sight?

Conversely, is Y4 a radiation sponge that will suck up a majority of radiation from the explosion??

You're talking about nova level energy release less than a single AU from the moon with zero LOS-obstruction. What do you think that would do to a biosphere, really?

It certainly wouldn't sterilize the planet. Y4 may have been LOS, but the DS was parked RIGHT NEXT to a gas giant!

Illuminatus Primus wrote:

Lord Poe wrote:BTW, Saxton puts the DS1 at the time it had a clear shot at Y4 "on the order of one or two hundred thousand kilometres" away.

Novae can release energy enough to ruin biospheres light-years away.

That just shows Yavin IV had an energy shield after all protecting it. Only way they could have withstood a sun (even for only a brief moment) shining on them from 200,000km away.

People have been wondering about that. Now we know

Before we start devolving into an argument over whether or not Yavin IV had a shield, I'm going to point out one thing: IP has a point about the energy release. HOWEVER, I didn't correctly portray the quote:

ANH novelization, page 216 wrote: "Behind them small flashes of fading light marked the receding station. Without warning, something appeared in the sky in place of it which was brighter than the glowing gas giant, brighter than its far-off sun. For a few seconds the eternal night became day. No one dared look directly at it. Not even multiple shields set on high could dim that awesome flare.

Space filled temporarily with trillions of microscopic metal fragments, propelled past the retreating ships by the liberated energy of a small artificial sun. The collapsed residue of the battle station would continue to consume itself for several days, forming for that brief span of time the most impressive tombstone in this corner of hte cosmos."

There is enough there, I think, to reconcile the apparent problem while illustrating my original point about the Death STar's fuel supplies.

Lord Poe wrote:That's a SW Tales story, right? Infinities.

You sure it is? I thought it was SW Empire. I could be wrong.

Lord Poe wrote:Conversely, is Y4 a radiation sponge that will suck up a majority of radiation from the explosion??

No, it doesn't have to. Novae release energy in the range that will sterilise biospheres light-years away. Any world in an obstructed LOS to a novae within an AU is totally dead. Period.

Lord Poe wrote:It certainly wouldn't sterilize the planet. Y4 may have been LOS, but the DS was parked RIGHT NEXT to a gas giant!

So what? The gas giant is off to its left and the moon is directly ahead of it. What the fuck difference does it matter that the Planet occupies much of the Death Star's sky which isn't taken up by the Moon? Is some of the hard gamma rays that are heading moonward going to veer off into the Planet cuz its big and to the left? Its sending out hard radiation in every direction; last I checked the DS explosion was pretty homogenous. The radiation heading toward the Planet is irrelevent to the Moon with or without the Planet--its heading along the wrong vector to hit the Moon.

All I was stating was that the "novae" release of energy is obviously a metaphorical/hyperbolic statement.

I believe it was said in the "Young Jedi Knights" book that after the pilot Quorl had crashed to the planet large swaths of jungle were wiped out by forest fires. I would submit that the jungle is more robust.

CaptainChewbacca wrote:I believe it was said in the "Young Jedi Knights" book that after the pilot Quorl had crashed to the planet large swaths of jungle were wiped out by forest fires. I would submit that the jungle is more robust.

Well the Empire did stick around and try to take the planet, so this could have been and probably was caused by a combination of combat and the few significant impactors from the Death Star wreckage which didn't fall into the gas giant.

Hard gamma rays will cook organisms, jungle or no jungle.

As I just pointed out, the energy released by the Death Star's explosion did not radiate outwards as pure radiatio0n (at least not totally), but as the quote indicates, the enerrgy output (predictably) accelerated/propelled the Death Star's own debris outwards!

The likely conclusion in both cases is then, that the mass of the Death Star's debris absorbed most of the energy released by the reactor in its own destruction. The Death Star debris would be propelled outwards (in addition to probably being melted if not vaporized).

What this means for Endor is that regardless of the Second Death STar's actual size, the energy has to reach that planet in some fashion. (IE the second Death Star also contained a large amount of the radiation, but then some of the reactor's energy release would be transferred to endor via the debris in one way or another. We're still left with the simple fact that it is not possible for the Rebel fleet to have dealt with that energgy in such a way as to save Endor, by ANY means neccesary.

Illuminatus Primus wrote:

CaptainChewbacca wrote:I believe it was said in the "Young Jedi Knights" book that after the pilot Quorl had crashed to the planet large swaths of jungle were wiped out by forest fires. I would submit that the jungle is more robust.

Well the Empire did stick around and try to take the planet, so this could have been and probably was caused by a combination of combat and the few significant impactors from the Death Star wreckage which didn't fall into the gas giant.

Hard gamma rays will cook organisms, jungle or no jungle.

Except that there were shields protecting the moon. The ANH novelisation, which was so handily posted to you by Connor, proved it.


The problem with Endor isn't so much that physics dictate that the moon must be destroyed, it is how to rationalise the events happening afterwards in both canon and EU.

The Truce at Bakura establishes that Rebel forces were tied up in destroying and removing dangerous debris in the Death Star orbit.

The radiation and other high energies that flooded the moon in the aftermath could be rationalised by the existence of the Endor planetary shield, which may not had been totally down at the time of the DS destruction. Its overridden by the EU, but that's okay. Furthermore, any lasting side effects could had been fixed by the Rebels medical technology.

PainRack wrote:The problem with Endor isn't so much that physics dictate that the moon must be destroyed, it is how to rationalise the events happening afterwards in both canon and EU.

The celebration in ROTJ alone is, IMO, virtually impossible to reconcile with the holocaust theory (nevermind all the EU references).

PainRack wrote:The radiation and other high energies that flooded the moon in the aftermath could be rationalised by the existence of the Endor planetary shield, which may not had been totally down at the time of the DS destruction.

I theorized the existence of a shield protecting the sanctuary moon itself. After all, what's to stop a rebel cruiser from delivering a BDZ-style bombardment to the Imperial base there?

I was unaware a shield can support billions of cubic kilometers of metal.

Besides, the ROTJ novelisation says the moon was unprotected when the generator blew.

So long as much of the ejecta was outright vaporized, the soot fallout will be somewhat delayed; additionally, the Rebels could've used shields and tractor beams and repulsors to push some of the ejecta away from the base area. However, moving the entire mass of the DS II away is virtually impossible.

And I don't see how this guy's solution helps much--all that mass will still come down, unless he's suggesting that nearly all of it was accelerated at least to escape velocity in all directions except that of the moon.

PainRack wrote:could be rationalised by the existence of the Endor planetary shield, which may not had been totally down at the time of the DS destruction.

ROTJ novelisation says nay.

I'm gonna sneak in here and risk this firestorm of galvanized ire to point something out

He uses zoom measurements to get FOVs. As I understand it (and was bluntly pointed out to me when I brought this up myself re: Alderaan's distance from DSI based on lens calculations), lenses used are not admissable as evidence under SoD. However, he's using the comparitive FOV using elements in frame only (so far as I can tell) and not the external real-world parameters of the cameras used...in this case, does this validate his use of lens properties? Or does it cast doubt on his claims?

Illuminatus Primus wrote:

PainRack wrote:could be rationalised by the existence of the Endor planetary shield, which may not had been totally down at the time of the DS destruction.

ROTJ novelisation says nay.

The ROTJ novelisation only notes that the Endor shield was down. There has been some contention for two shielding systems, one protecting exclusively the Death Star and one the moon, as opposed to the conventional model of one shield protecting both, based on Ackbar briefing.

The destruction of the shield is acknowledged by various EU and film references materials though..

The celebration in ROTJ alone is, IMO, virtually impossible to reconcile with the holocaust theory (nevermind all the EU references).

While its pushing it, the Rebels could had easily regrouped at the Ewok village and awaited rescue there.

PainRack wrote: The ROTJ novelisation only notes that the Endor shield was down. There has been some contention for two shielding systems, one protecting exclusively the Death Star and one the moon, as opposed to the conventional model of one shield protecting both, based on Ackbar briefing.

The destruction of the shield is acknowledged by various EU and film references materials though..

Actually, when the shield went down the planet AND Death Star were left unprotected (according to the novelization)

Assuming it exists, is it possible that the Rebels repaired the planetary shield generator before the bulk of the debris hit the planet? Or, alternately, calibrated it to be at a lower altitude so that it would intercept already-atmospheric the debris before it reached the ground? Given the size of the explosion of the DS generator and the probable velocity of the particles, this is probably really far-fetched, but I thought I'd bring it up just the same.

Considering that the entire shield projection installation exploded, I'd say it's doubtful.

I've personally never seen any sort of believable evidence pointing to there being a shield protecting anything other than the small amount surrounding the projector itself, as showed by the Rebel holoprojection. I personally conclude that the moon itself was unprotected.

Yeah, that's the implication from the film and novelization for sure. It just seems very difficult to accept the idea that Endor was wiped out, especially given that there's A) a party and B) a novel that immediatley followes the events in ROTJ (Truce at Bakura) and it doesn't mention it either.

PainRack wrote:The ROTJ novelisation only notes that the Endor shield was down. There has been some contention for two shielding systems, one protecting exclusively the Death Star and one the moon, as opposed to the conventional model of one shield protecting both, based on Ackbar briefing.

No it does not. It says something to the effect of (I don't have my copy on hand right now) "and the Death Star and Sanctuary Moon were left unprotected."

It specifies that there is nothing protecting Endor anymore.

PainRack wrote:While its pushing it, the Rebels could had easily regrouped at the Ewok village and awaited rescue there.

The stupid "celebration" stuff is easier to reconcile with last minute help from the fleet and whatnot than a total prevention of the moon's destruction.

Those who trumpet that act as if just because the fleet could have delayed the effects long enough to regroup and savor a moment of victory, that they could totally and indefinitely prevent the fallout from obliterating Endor's biosphere. That's stupid.

McC wrote:Assuming it exists, is it possible that the Rebels repaired the planetary shield generator before the bulk of the debris hit the planet? Or, alternately, calibrated it to be at a lower altitude so that it would intercept already-atmospheric the debris before it reached the ground? Given the size of the explosion of the DS generator and the probable velocity of the particles, this is probably really far-fetched, but I thought I'd bring it up just the same.

The only possible thing I could conceive of to account for any "reactivation" of the shield might be some sort of built-in redundancy of some sort. Maybe there was at least another shield generator (its quite reasonable to conclude, since most starships, even small ships like say the Falcon, incorporate at least TWO generators.)

However, even then, the shield might at best "stop" the debris from hitting, but there is still a real possibility that it would simply "settle" over the surface of the shield (and then fall to Endor when the shield burns out or is turned off) unless they had some way to reflect or redirect it (maybe they do...I can't say)

Edit: What I mean is that the shield might stop most of the energy from the debris actually impacting the planet, but it wouldnt neccesarily prevent the debris from reaching the planet at SOME point once the shield were turned off. Unless the Rebels "cleaned" it up somehow. (and there is still that gap in the shields directly over the Death Star's orbit anyhow)

And there is still a small problem created by the fact the Rebels STILL blew up that generator, which is going to still leave a gap in the defenses that they may very well not be able to redirect or cover in time, so even then you're only looking at limiting the effects, not nullifying them. (the fact that debris did seem to be falling over the Ewok village the Rebels were in at the end of ROTJ - as mentioned in the radio drama, seems to suggest teh gap still existed.)

Edit: The real benefit of the shield being active is that it helps explain how Endor might have been "restored" frfom the results of the holocaust (Having the "dust" settle on the shields could make it easier to clean) - which is something I believe Mike suggested before as a potential solution. But in reality you can't really ignore the fact that there WOULD be inevitable consequences from the Death STar's explosion without attempting to reduce its observed capabilities (ie Darkstar) - at best you can only attempt a degree of mitigation for the effects.

That would happen if such shields behave as solid barriers. What if the shield absorbs (and in the case of debris, consumes) energy and re-radiates it? Or is that not the way SW shields work?

Slartibartfast wrote:That would happen if such shields behave as solid barriers. What if the shield absorbs (and in the case of debris, consumes) energy and re-radiates it? Or is that not the way SW shields work?

Some have been shown to behave as solid barriers.

Something began to take shape around the robot, a pulsating glow that gradually covered the machine as if with a transparent dome. Quickly this force field solidified, repelling the blowing snow that brushed over the droid's hull.

After a moment the glow faded, and the blowing snow soon formed a perfect dome of white, completely concealing the droid and its protective force field.

ESB novelization page 24

That could be describing a specially designed shield, though.