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Beyond Earth - Episode 3
« on: May 17, 2015, 11:26:25 AM »
Beyond Earth
Episode 3: First Steps

6th January


On the 6th of January Andrew Kirk finally completed his research into a Troop Transport Bay that could carry a Battalion sized force. With this in place the Navy quickly came up with a ship design to make use of this new ship module.

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Leander class Troop Transport    4 450 tons     50 Crew     299 BP      TCS 89  TH 240  EM 0
2696 km/s     Armour 1-24     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 3     PPV 0
Maint Life 3.14 Years     MSP 126    AFR 52%    IFR 0.7%    1YR 19    5YR 288    Max Repair 60 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months    Spare Berths 2   
Troop Capacity: 1 Battalion   

Tarnell Drive Systems 120 EP Ion Drive (2)    Power 120    Fuel Use 72%    Signature 120    Exp 10%
Fuel Capacity 500 000 Litres    Range 28.1 billion km   (120 days at full power)

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The Leander Class was born designed to be cheap and effective troop transport the Leander could transport a single Battalion size unit to any planet in the inner SOL system. The Hyde Engineering Orbital Shipyard began re-equipping its gantries to be able to build this new class of ship.

11th March

It had been recognised that economy on an interplanetary scale was not easily understood and that the logistics of getting things around the solar system was much more tricky than the logistics of getting something around a single planet. Research had been commissioned into ways of improving the federations economy and expanding it so that it can deal with Interplanetary logistical solutions. On the 11th a project concluded that the economy could be expanded by 20% to accommodate the problems being faced.

A month later on the 11th April three new mobile infantry battalions were deployed on Earth drawn up from new recruits across the globe these new battalions would be slated for deployment to the colonies should things really get out of hand.

6th May

Hyde Engineering shipyards finishes retooling for the Leander Class Troop Transport, its two slipways would be put to use building two new troop transports, in order to transport soldiers to the colonies to help keep the peace. Initially two Transports where slated to be built with the possibility of more being built in the future as and when they where needed.

26th November

Duncan Marine Industries finished increasing its capacity by 1000 tons, Audacious class vessels where laid down immediately in its three slip ways. With current technology the ships would take roughly 4 years to build. With increasing tensions at the colonies a much cheaper quicker to build vessel was needed and fast.

8th January, tensions where rising to boiling point by this time the Colonies where experiencing riots but the police where managing to keep it under control for now. Earth watched with mild shock at the turmoil in the colonies those who had gone to the colonies and become disillusioned with their domes when they could be settling on worlds like earth in other solar systems.

21st February

The UFES Leander and the UFES Battlespace leave the orbital gantries, with the ever deteriorating state of the colonies, it is decided to forgo the shakedown cruise and immediately start ferrying military forces to the colonies. The 11th and 12th Garrison Battalions would be the first troops to be deployed to the Colonies of Mars and Luna.

The day after the three jump scout tenders rolled off the line the Lapis Lazuli, Sapphire and Obsidian would fly the jump scouts to the Node Points, before the jump scouts would detach and explore the node point. Loading their squadrons of Leaper Jump Scouts the three ships set off from earth orbit to the first three Node Points.

3rd March

The Lapis Lazuli reached the First Node Point on the 3rd of March releasing its squadron of Leapers Exploration Squadron #3 Silver Lobos made the transition successfully to Bernard's Star one of Sols Neighbours. However exploration of the system did not return any promising results the system owned several terrestrial worlds but none with a breathable atmosphere that could support human life.

After several days of exploration the Squadron transited back into the SOL system and reported back their findings. Once docked up with their tender the Lapis Lazuli set course for the 4th and Final Node Point.

With the ever increasing profit to be made in transporting good between the growing colonies in SOL a new shipping line sprang up Turner Interplanetary Transport began trading on the 6th of March, currently there where 16 civilian ships in operation around the SOL system.

On the same day Doctor Madison Thompson completed her research into improving Shipyard operations costs and time by 5%. By this time 12 more Terraforming stations had been completed on earth and were ready for transport even with the increasing tensions on Mars it was deemed that the facilities would still be transported to the colony it was hoped that the extra stations would give the population a small sliver of hope that the world might be fully habitable in a few generations rather than the initial estimates. It would take a significant effort from the River class Freighters and  would take some time to do.

On the 11th of March the Scout Tender Obsidian reached the 2nd Node Point in the SOL system launching its jump scouts the squadron warmed up its Node drives and made the transition to Proxima Centauri a solar system with a tiny red dwarf sun. The system contained one potentially habitable planet if the resources and investment of terraforming it was put in but it would take many many years before it became remotely habitable for human life. Sitting at the lower end of humans gravity tolerance the system was marked as low priority for further exploration when a new jump drive for the Tender vessels developed.

The Exploration squadron stayed on the Node Point for a few days before returning back to SOL to report what they found.

On the 13ths of March the Tender Sapphire reached the 3rd Node Point found in the SOL system following procedure it launched its scout squadron who transited through Node Space to the system Ross 128. The system was home to a slightly brighter Red Dwarf star, with 2 Super Jovians and 2 gas giants the system had a significant number of moons but what made this system special was the potentially habitable world, the second planet from the sun was a rocky terrestrial world that with the addition of some Green house gasses and oxygen could very quickly be transformed into an ideal world for human habitation. Ross 128 was marked as high priority for further exploration. If Trans-Newtonian materials could be found on these worlds the system be ideal for the survival and growth of the human race. The announcement of a potentially habitable world in the system was met with some enthusiasm in the colonies and even on earth.
Due to the composition of the atmosphere the Exploration squadron moved in closer to take some more detailed readings of the planet. With the discovery on Ross 128 the Federal government gave the Ministry of exploration the mandate of exploring Interstellar space. With the SOL system surveyed and with only one more Node Point left to explore many questioned what the Ministry would do next to stop itself from becoming redundant. A lot rode on keeping the ministry around politically so its mandate was expanded and given an almost limitless budget.

Instantly the Ministry set about scrapping its old system survey vessels and redesigning its Jump Tenders and developing a new Leaper Vessel that was capable of gravitational and geological surveys. With Node Drives proved to be practical and safe larger vessels in the future would be designed to be able to jump into Node Space and transition into new systems.

Jump drives where not available to civilian shipping lines yet, so another field of study was begin. Research into a Gate mechanism that in theory could allow any ship to travel through node space without a Node Drive to carry them through.

22nd March

The Terraforming of Mars had been going for several years now and whilst there where still many more years to go research into the terraforming process and the addition of extra terraformers to the planet had sped up the process from it taking several hundred years to maybe a decade or two at longest estimates. With the addition of Safe Greenhouse Gasses to the atmosphere the world had heated up significantly in the past 3 years. So much so that reports had started coming in that the northern and southern poles ice sheets had began melting meaning that for the first time in several million years that water had began to flow freely on the Martian surface.

For the first time since man settled on the Martian surface thicker rain clouds began to form around the poles. Thicker clouds compared to the wispy high atmospheric clouds that had once been seen. Whilst it would take years for the ice caps to thaw out naturally it was the turning point in the Terraformation process from this point on things would be much easier.

On the 23rd of March the Lapis Lazuli reached the 4th and final Node Point in the SOL system. Once again following procedure the vessel launched its scouts which preceded to transition to the system Luyten 726-8.

Luyten 726-8 was yet again another unremarkable system in terms of habitability, what made it interesting however was the fact that it was a binary star system. Whilst it had been known for a long time that Binary and even Trinary star systems existed Luyten 726-8 was the first Binary system to have been visited by the Human race. Whilst unremarkable it had been marked as medium priority for exploration as many wondered what the effects of two stars on a Star system would have on the availability of Trans-Newtonian Materials.

The Exploration squadron stayed for a few days to record their findings before returning back to the SOL system. With all 4 Node points explored and catalogued the Ministry of Exploration called all of its ships back to earth. Its current ageing fleet of ships was not equipped for interstellar exploration.

A new fleet of ships would be needed to explore further a field. Using current technologies a refitted Comet Class Tender was designed. 3250 tonnes larger than its predecessor the ship was capable of moving through Node Space rather than sitting on a point and letting its scouts travel through to the next system. The new Comet Class vessel would jump to the system itself and position itself out of harms way With a greatly expanded boat bay the new Comet class was capable of carrying 2000 tonnes worth of vessels in its hull. The only downside to this was that with all the additional weight its speed was reduced down to almost half of what its original design was.

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Comet J1 class Jump Scout Tender    8 750 tons     162 Crew     973.6 BP      TCS 175  TH 360  EM 0
2057 km/s    JR 3-50     Armour 1-37     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/80/0/0     Damage Control Rating 1     PPV 0
Maint Life 2.46 Years     MSP 1070    AFR 612%    IFR 8.5%    1YR 245    5YR 3675    Max Repair 114 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months    Flight Crew Berths 0   
Hangar Deck Capacity 2000 tons     

Kal-Tech Industries J9000(3-50) Military Jump Drive     Max Ship Size 9000 tons    Distance 50k km     Squadron Size 3
Rolls-Royce  180 EP Ion Drive (2)    Power 180    Fuel Use 68%    Signature 180    Exp 10%
Fuel Capacity 2 000 000 Litres    Range 60.5 billion km   (340 days at full power)

North Orbital Systems EM Detection Sensor EM10-80 (1)     Sensitivity 80     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  80m km
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The Leaper Jump Scout had been a scientific success but it wasn’t very practical only good for quick surveys of the system before returning home to its Tender. The New Leaper II class vessels where much larger. No longer classed as a fighter class vessel at 1000 tonnes the Leaper II's replaced their jump drives for sophisticated scanner equipment, making them ideal for surveying systems. The plan was that 2-3 Comets would enter a system release their survey ships and wait until the system was surveyed before moving on to the next one.

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Leaper II class Jump Scout    1 000 tons     35 Crew     276.8 BP      TCS 20  TH 24  EM 0
1200 km/s     Armour 1-8     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/1/1     Damage Control Rating 1     PPV 0
Maint Life 9.75 Years     MSP 173    AFR 8%    IFR 0.1%    1YR 3    5YR 49    Max Repair 100 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 9 months    Spare Berths 1   

Duncan Dynamics 4.8 EP Ion Drive (5)    Power 4.8    Fuel Use 8.02%    Signature 4.8    Exp 4%
Fuel Capacity 20 000 Litres    Range 44.9 billion km   (432 days at full power)

Gravitational Survey Sensors (1)   1 Survey Points Per Hour
Geological Survey Sensors (1)   1 Survey Points Per Hour

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

This new approach to exploration however required more infrastructure to be created on Earth and on the colonies. Including new Orbital shipyards to accommodate the extra space needed to construct the new exploration fleet.

7th April

Andrew Kirk completed his research into improving Ship Construction techniques. Giving a significant boost ship construction facilities in orbit. Although the Ministry of Exploration was offering a generous budget to develop Node Gate Technologies he elected to stay on with the Military and continue to improve Ship building techniques. It was his thinking that improving the human races ability to build bigger and better ships would make it easier in the long run for the human race to explore the stars.

By now the infrastructure to set up on Mars and Luna was nearing capacity overcrowding was starting to become a massive concern. Thankfully on earth more infrastructure had been in production, forward planning had predicted that over population would be a problem in the early days of the colonies whilst they were not capable of producing enough infrastructure domestically to support the population growth. With the last of the new Terraformers on earth the fleet of River Class freighters where called upon again to transport a shipment of infrastructure to Mars and Luna. In thee future the civillian shipping lines would be called upon to do much of the heavy lifting leaving the River class Freighters to more important jobs.

On the 23rd of May Jonathan Naylor Completed research into the terraforming rate of terraformer installations. His research further increased their efficiency further speeding up the time it would take to terraform Mars into a world that could support human life without Domes or life support infrastructure.

3rd July

On the third of July the Navy announced a new class of military vessel. Much smaller than the 11000 ton monitors the Sheffield class Corvette would be tasked with defending Earth and the colonies from any threats and would be the first ship in a line of system defence vessels. Carrying a newly developed Twin 15cm Near Ultraviolet Laser cannon turret the ship was designed to be small and fast and get in close to any potential threats and blast them with its main armament. Ultimately though it was just a picket vessel for larger fleet formations that the navy planned to run in the future.

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Sheffield class Corvette    5 350 tons     153 Crew     1026.4 BP      TCS 107  TH 480  EM 0
4485 km/s     Armour 2-27     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/80/0/0     Damage Control Rating 3     PPV 14.04
Maint Life 3.15 Years     MSP 360    AFR 76%    IFR 1.1%    1YR 55    5YR 818    Max Repair 180 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 8 months    Spare Berths 2   

Tarnell Drive Systems 120 EP Ion Drive (4)    Power 120    Fuel Use 72%    Signature 120    Exp 10%
Fuel Capacity 400 000 Litres    Range 18.7 billion km   (48 days at full power)

Twin General Dynamics 15cm C3 Near Ultraviolet Laser Turret (1x2)    Range 180 000km     TS: 12000 km/s     Power 12-6     RM 3    ROF 10        6 6 6 4 3 3 2 2 2 1
North Orbital Systems Fire Control S08 96-12000 (1)    Max Range: 192 000 km   TS: 12000 km/s     95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
General Dynamics Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor Technology PB-1 (1)     Total Power Output 18    Armour 0    Exp 5%

North Orbital Systems Active Search Sensor MR144-R100 (1)     GPS 18000     Range 144.0m km    Resolution 100
North Orbital Systems EM Detection Sensor EM10-80 (1)     Sensitivity 80     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  80m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Before production could begin however more Orbital shipyards would be needed to handle the extra capacity needed for construction.

24th December


Two more Leander Class Troop Transports were completed on Christmas eve the UFES Marine and the UFES Waterloo would make a grand total of 4 Leander Class Troop Transports that could be called upon to transport ground forces around the Colonies where ever they may be needed.

With the completion of the Leander class vessels, Hyde Engineering shipyards began retooling for the new Sheffield class Corvettes.
« Last Edit: May 17, 2015, 11:30:21 AM by Hydrofoil »