Some Like It Hot
29 Sep 2017Robert Phillips
Having spent many months on 2 large exploration trips, it's easy to dismiss some of the awesome locations within human populated space. There are some locations well worth visiting.Skardee 1 is such a location.
It orbits a mere 2.64LS from its primary star, a class G white-yellow star. Compare that to Mercury which orbits Sol at a distance of 227.14LS, and you realise that it must be *really* hot there! In fact, Skardee 1 has a surface temperature of 986K (712.85 Celsius).
I switched over to The Wasp, one of my fastest and most manoeuvrable ships, and decided to pay it a visit to see if I could land there.
It was an interesting experience.
Skardee 1 is so close to the star that my Fuel Scoop activated well before I entered orbital cruise. This prompted me to shut down any unnecessary systems (including the fuel scoop) to reduce heat generation. My ship is engineered for speed, so it runs quite hot (35% at Supercruise). Even before I entered orbital cruise, alarms were ringing and heat levels were well over 100%. At 165% I dropped a heat sink to give short term relief, enough for me to cruise along the surface and find a place to set down:
But after less than a minute, my heat alarms were ringing again, and systems were taking damage. I landed, deployed my SRV, and dismissed my ship as quickly as possible to prevent further damage.
My SRV was able to cope with the heat a lot better, no doubt due to it's smaller power generator. This allowed me to get some spectacular views. The star looks enormous from this distance, and is literally blinding, filling virtually the whole visible sky:
Nothing would last very long on this surface.
I gathered some materials, and recalled my ship. As soon as my engines powered up for lift off, my heat levels had already reached critical levels. I boosted away from the ground and entered Supercruise as quickly as possible, but it wasn't enough - systems started taking serious damage, and even dropping a heat sink didn't help. My heat sink launcher was destroyed by the heat (the irony!), my shields collapsed, and my hull was melting.
Climbing out of the planet's gravity well seemed to be taking forever. Heat levels peaked at 319%.
Weapons went offline, the power distributor gave up, the canopy breached, shields failed, and life support went offline. I was on a limited supply of oxygen. It was a miracle my drives were still working.
And then, at 4.5LS from the star, the heat levels began to drop. A blessed relief from the heat at last! Eventually the heat levels dropped to nominal levels, and I was able to limp back to the nearest Star Port (Heck Reserve) for repairs:
My Oxygen supply gave me just enough time to get there, but the sensors were destroyed, so I was unable to contact the base for docking permission. I had to initiate a full shut down and repair. Then, with 2 mins of Oxygen and 17% hull integrity left, I finally docked.
There wasn't much left of my ship, but I had made it.
No more trips to Skardee 1 for a while…