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Cross The Atlantic Ocean In 3 Days - By Ship
Mr. Anonymous writes: "I keep wondering where do they find such stuff. ZZZ online is updated again, with issue #69. They write about FastShip - a 250 meters long water jet ship able to cross the Atlantic Ocean in 3 days. Speedy beast :-) It can also carry 10,000 tons of cargo." Note that this should all be couched in hypotheticals -- but I'd sure prefer to travel to Europe one day by boat than plane, and 2003 isn't that far from now.
It seems that way to me...
One billion tons? 1 km in length? What the hell are you smoking? A ship that size would be have ten thousand times the displacement of today's 100,000 ton aircraft carriers, and over three times their length as well.
The reason freight train takes high priority over passenger train is because Amtrack doesn't own any rail tracks excpet that of North East Corridor (Bos-NY-Wash).
Private rail companies, which doesn't have passenger service, own most of the tracks, and their controller natually have their freight train pass and keep Amtrack waiting.
--- You make things foolproof, and they'll find you a damn fool.
Hi!
I think this is a Very Bad Idea.
Right now, there are a lot of sailing ships around. I've lived on one of these things for 5 years, and you always live with the spectre of a hige metal wall suddenly looming over you.
Commercial shipping is dangerous enough already - high-speed boats would make sailing yachts impossible.
Case in point: on the north sea, high-speed ferries are in operation. Sailors are absolutely terrified.
---
"What, I need a *reason* for everything?" -- Calvin
Free PC version of ChipWits at http://www.breueronline.de/klaus/chipwits/
A boat that fast will ensure that atlantic whales become extinct in decades!
And we know what happens when whales go extinct...
Giant, glowing, rod-shaped alien spacecraft start sucking the water out of the oceans.
I think that's a good enough reason to save the whales.
--K
Aren't these the same as the boats deployed around the British Isles? I took one from Wales to Ireland a few years ago, and I heard that they were talking of deploying them between England and France too. They're fast: we crossed the Irish Sea in under 1.5 hours. Dunno how they handle in rough weather though as we were lucky to have two calm trips.
And now it's rusting away in (I think) Norfolk because, a few years after it went to sea, the passenger jet aircraft appeared on the scene.
Best Slashdot Co
"Also last time I checked a plane could go over the atlantic in something under 8 hours"
Yep, we did Toronto to London in 6 hours a few weeks ago. Of course, London to New York on Concorde is something like 3 hours or less.
And somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but as I recall the Titanic's trip was less than 72 hours before it hit the iceberg, and it was not far at all from reaching port when that happened. So why is a 3-day trip so surprising almost 90 years later?
-Steve :)
@HbFyo0$k8 tH!$
the blue riband is the award given to the fastest transatlantic ship. the subject of heated competition until the late 1950's, the blue riband is given only to real ships. they must be commercial vessels and have to complete the trip without refueling. this decision was made after a richard branson, owner of the virgin company, made a speedboat specifically designed to break the record. the virgin challanger ii had to be refuelled three times and had no purpose other that trying to take the blue riband.
the SS United States is the current westbound record holder. The record was set in July 1952 at 3days 12hours 12minutes at 34.51 knots.
The eastbound record was held by the ss United states for nearly 38 years until a hovercraft broke the record in 1990.
the current eastbound record holder is Catlink V, a 91 meter catamaran ferry which completed the trip in 2days 20hours 9minutes at 41.28 knots.
here's a site about the riband: http://www.blueriband.com/
when religion is no longer the opiate of the masses, governments will resort to real opiates.
I'll see your two cents and raise it to four. Not only can we speed up our journeys or product-transports (where are we going so fast anyway?), but we should also be able to speed up the decline of a number of marine species - thump a few whales on the noggin while speeding across the Atlantic.
They probably don't give a damn about animals, but maybe if the US Army complains that their submarines can't use their sonar equipment anymore ...
EagerEyes.org: Visualization and Visual Communication
About 5 or 10 years ago in New Zealand they started operating some larger and faster cataraman ferrys between the north and south islands. The ferrys travel for most of their journey through an area called the Marlborough Sounds, which is mostly national park, and an area of great beauty, and value in terms of tourism and conservation. Recently there has been a lot of controversy over their operation as it was found that the wake from these boatswas doing real damage to shorelines in the sounds, i.e. basically destroying the habitat of all those small cratures that live right on the edge of the water. I'm not sure how exactly long these boats are, but on the order of about 100 metres I would guess. So large fast boats can have serious environmental consequences, especially in coastal waters.
Never trust a man in a blue trench coat, Never drive a car when you're dead
I read that the biggest problem in getting aid to people struck by the earthquake in India was not getting the supplies to the region -- it was distributing the supplies once they arrived. Airplanes can get supplies to disaster areas but it still needs to be distributed efficiently.
At that speed it'll shatter Icebergs
No, not in terms of energy efficiency. If you have a displacement hull that is not travelling faster than it's hull speed (a theoretical maximum speed for a hull that is not planing, directly related to the waterline length) then the hull is effectively riding its own wave, and there is very little drag at all. If you carry a lot of wait through the air you have to use a lot of energy just to keep that weight up in the air. With a boat the displaced water supports that weight, and you only have to use energy to move that mass horizontally.
Never trust a man in a blue trench coat, Never drive a car when you're dead
Wouldn't the pitch changes be proportionally less, not more, at high speeds?
Hewing to a 12 mile rule might add a few hours to the time. Instead of arriving at 8 am in London, you get there at noon. Big deal.
The US (and most other countries) have outlawed non-military supersonic flight in their airspaces. This is a major reason the only cities the Concorde ever served regularly were (other than London/Paris) New York, Washington, Miami, and Rio de Janeiro. To go 500 miles inland is to add one hour to the flight time, decreasing the average speed aignificantly. This would reduce the Concorde's advantage, time, which is the reason they could get away with those high ticket prices.
Aircraft-type seating is comfortable!?
Compared to what? A splintered broom handle?
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Having enjoyed the speed of a recent catamaran trip across the Channel, but not enjoyed the seasickness so much...can anyone explain the technology behind this FastShip? Could it really carry passengers? I have my doubts, given the sickness-inducing speed...unless it hovers or something.
-curious flaneur
Since Congress created the Navy in the 1790's, there has been a rivalry between the Army and Navy (thus things like the annual Army/Navy football game). When the Army started developing their Air Corps in World War One, the Navy began pushing to have their own Air Corps. In the 20's they finally succeeded and started building aircraft carriers.
In WWII, it was decided that it was a good idea to keep the split air forces, because it was deemed easier to train sailors to fly than to train fliers (who were themselves often converted soldiers) to sail.
It wasn't until 1947 that the Air Force was formed out of the US Army Air Corps.
I can't imagine something that is able to go this fast being very sea worthy. Sems like we'll see a little bad weather and a few hundred of these boats on the Atlantic floor. Also last time I checked a plane could go over the atlantic in something under 8 hours. So these things are certainly not passenger carriers.
Tom Hanks will NEVER get rescued.
...Cue visual of Hanks running down the beach with the flashlight, stops, looks: The boat moves all the way across the horizon in about 5 seconds...
"Damn, Wilson! Another Fastboat"
El Karma: excelente(principalmente la suma de moderación hecha a los comentarios de los usuarios)
According to the USAF:
I see these gigantic puppies in the air all the time: one of the key bases for these is a former B-52 base, Westover, that's now a Reserve base.
I used to work for Newport News Shipbuilding, the company that build the SS United States. Yesterday they ran an article in a local paper on the history of the ship and its future. The ship was mothballed in 1969, I believe. It has changed ownership several times usually with the organization with plans for refurbishing the ship going broke. The last owners salvaged all the ornate interior woodwork. Today there is yet another owner trying to raise the $350mil to get the ship seaworthy again. It really is a beautiful ship. I hope he succeedes.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Seth
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
Anyway, catagorize this along with
"flaircraft" that "fly" with weird wings that push against high pressure squeezed between them and the ground a few feet below. Make it big enough and it can transport a lot passingers in comfort.
passenger and cargo submarines that go fast and save fuel because they are under the surface turbulence.
Giant planes with giant clear bubble domes on top and swimming pools.
Standing tough under stars and stripes
We can tell
This dream's in sight
You've got to admit it
At this point in time that it's clear
The future looks bright
On that train all graphite and glitter
Undersea by rail
Ninety minutes from New York to Paris
Well by seventy-six we'll be A.O.K.
What a beautiful world this will be
What a glorious time to be free
Get your ticket to that wheel in space
While there's time
The fix is in
You'll be a witness to that game of chance in the sky
You know we've got to win
Here at home we'll play in the city
Powered by the sun
Perfect weather for a streamlined world
There'll be spandex jackets one for everyone
What a beautiful world this will be
What a glorious time to be free
On that train all graphite and glitter
Undersea by rail
Ninety minutes from New York to Paris
(More leisure for artists everywhere)
A just machine to make big decisions
Programmed by fellows with compassion and vision
We'll be clean when their work is done
We'll be eternally free yes and eternally young
What a beautiful world this will be
What a glorious time to be free
Sneakemail is to spam filters what an ounce of prevention is to a pound of cure.
Ekrano/wig-planes
It is my understanding that most modern cargo vessels can cruise at about 20 knots. The choose to chug allong at about 13 knots because that is where the "sweet spot" is. Having a single gas turbine engine spinning one impeller at a high enough RPM to drive a large cargo ship at high speed is possible, but who wants to pay the fuel cost?
For now, I'm gonna chalk this one up to wishfull thinking. And maybe Coast Guard/military specops. Just take a look at the films from the '50s and '60s previewing all the inventions that we will be using in 2000. The main difference between then and now is that they actually had working prototypes of the suitcase car and the inflatible airplane.
I'd rather you do it wrong, than for me to have to do it at all.
Here in HK the hydrofoils I take to get to Macau feel much more like airplanes (smooth and boring) than boats. The initial acceleration presses you into your seat like a plane and once the boat is up on the foils it's pretty much isolated from the chop. And there you are...just sitting there...eating peanuts and drinking sprite. The pitching and splashing of the local ferries is so much more fun. I don't think I'd be into a long voyage on a plane or a boat, but I certainly don't like being so isolated from the sea that I'm not even aware of it.
Sonar is Echoed off the hall of the ship, I don't think noise of an engine is is going to effect it much..maybe, I am not a Sonar expert.
A normal wave has a part which is lower than the waterlevel and a part which is higher. A soliton wave only has the part which is higher than the main water level. It is a "wall" of water traveling across the sea. It can do real damage to the shoreline and f.i. ships it meets, overturning them.
So these soliton waves have devastating effects, although I dont know why. If someone could enlighten me on that part, that would be nice as well.Sig (appended to the end of comments I post, 54 chars)
no. no one imports crack directly, it is imported as coke then cooked into crack right here in the good USA.
--
Hello *,
On the QE2, I've crossed the North Atlantic in 4.5 days. It was one of those cheap moving-the-ship-around trips, so they cared more about speed that having a long enjoyable trip. Now they do, the run in five days, slow and relaxed.
Three days sounds like a yawn to me, wake me up when they do it overnight!
-krish
My Grandpa was an engineer on a similar project in the sixties. They had a prototype build, it just wasn't economically feasible then. I think it was FMC, but I'm not positive. -W
When you consider the data rate of moving 10,000 tons of high density data storage across the Atlantic in three days, this is also probably the fastest "network", or data transfer mechanism currently available from U.S. to Europe.
Why can't one build power plants using gas turbines instead of boilers? I mean, the article said that the FastShip uses five turbines producing 250 MW each... In aggregate, that's 1.25 GW if you ran the output shafts to an electrical generator. After you get the power off the turbine, you can collect the combustion heat using a heat exchanger and use the steam from that to produce some additional power. And as the parent of this post said, with the proper baffles and muffling (the heat exchanger would probably help in this area), the noise pollution is as near zero as anything else. Gas turbines can probably be designed to run on just about any liquid or gas-phase fuel you'd care to mention from hydrogen to kerosene, so fluctuations in fuel cost wouldn't have nearly the catastrophic effect on operations. And gas turbines are probably much cleaner than a coal plant at the same level of power output.
The only question is, what am I missing? I haven't been able to talk to anyone who would know what the relative efficiencies of boilers and gas turbines are, so I have no clue what the economics are as far as fuel usage. I'm also not sure if, say, 2 GW (eight turbines in a plant) is anywhere near the type of capacity that current power plants operate at. Can anyone give me an evaluation on whether I'm in the right ballpark or not?
--Fesh
--Fesh
Kill -9 'em all, let root@localhost sort 'em out.
How much noise does a hurricane make? Boats are small compared to nature.
_ _ _
I was working on a flat tax proposal and I accidentally proved there's no god.
Hence the resurgence in popularity of Airships. Zeppelin's making a new one, as is ATG
Well when I went to Canada last (1997 - http://www.polsci.wvu.edu/henry/travels/) a new ferry service just started which could cross the Bay of Fundy in 3 hours. While I was there, one of these ferries ran over a 65 foot fishing boat. Literary.
As for the "Perfect Storm" - (1) The ship was built in the 60s. (2) It is a military ship - designed to work under extream condidtions and punch its way though waves.
III.IIVIVIXIIVIVIIIVVIIIIXVIIIXIIIIIIIIVIIIIVVIII
Well, in the middle of the Atlantic, nobody will be there to hear it! Presumably it could go more slowly, and quietly, in port.
sulli
RTFJ.
Or if the price for a stateroom was about the same as for a tourist class seat on an airplane. But this depends on whether the ride is rough or smooth. The general rule is that the bigger the ship, the less it is tossed around by the waves. With a big ship, you can design it so speed actually stabilizes them, in normal weather. But the North Atlantic makes waves bigger than any ship...
To ship cargo, though, this could be useful, and might even make money.
sulli
RTFJ.
I don't have time at the moment to read all of the commentary regarding this issue and it is possible that someone mentioned my own observation. Just last week I was discussing with a fellow worker the issue surrounding the US "scientist" who was held by the Russian authorities for spying. It turns out that he was seeking information regarding a sub launched missle...that is able to travel several hundred miles per hour underwater by creating a stream of bubbles at the nose. If one were to use that same technology to help propel the submerged bow of a large ship so as to modify the laminar flow up to a particular speed...and then again the same technology on a submerged hydrofoil...the hydrofoil would be able to raise the large hull out of the water. Traveling on a small surface area will surely make the boat go faster. Forget standard sailing hulls...they cannot touch hydrofoils. With the current technologies available they just need to set gyroscopes to the systems developed. As for fast and large boats go look to the Playstation II and it's competitors. Many are 75 to 120' long and are now setting world records WITHOUT HYDROFOILS.
According to some dinner conversation I had a few years ago, Korean Air ships DRAM into SFO by plane, and ships back cherries on the same planes. Kind of a weird juxtaposition.
---- "If we have to go on with these damned quantum jumps, then I'm sorry that I ever got involved" - Erwin Schrodinger
I'd just like to see it planing over a 10 metre swell!
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From the article:
"The ship will be really fast - it's top speed will be around 43 knots"
But maybe that will be enough.
--
"I'm surfin the dead zone
--
"I'm surfin the dead zone
In the twilight, unknown"
.... TITANIC? hahhaha. Its probably safer by plane, dont you think so?
I live on the south coast of the UK, and we've got a new high speed passenger ship that does the run over to france.
The current one will do 50 knots unlaiden and fully fueled, and the one they've got on order will cruise at 55 knots with a top speed of 70 unlaiden. Admittedly its only passengers + cars and the odd truck, but it sure beats the 15 knot ferries!
This post will enter the public domain 70 years after my death, unless Disney buys another extension.
the
seacat built in Australia is almost as fast and has been in production for a few years, even the Oz army has one, they used it from Darwin during the East Timor dispute.
The DevilCat operates from 21 December 2000 to 16 April 2001, and is a fast wave-piercing catamaran ferry offering comfortable aircraft-type seating and refreshment facilities.
It makes the 300 mile trip in six hours or so, at a speed of 80km/h (50m/h).
Open Source. Closed Minds. We are Slashdot.
Surface - Theoretical transit time, around 10 days, total delivery time 6-8 weeks.
Air - Theoretical transit time, 7-12 hours, total delivery time 10-14 days.
Basically what I'm saying, is that a ship that can cross the Atlantic in 3 days would be the most pointless thing imagineable if the cargo is just going to sit in a warehouse when it arrives. Sorting out the appallingly bad distribution networks at each end would be much more useful.
Noise is not necissarly an issue. A friend of mine used to work at a aero-drivative turbine generation plant for the navy. Inside the building were a few jet engines running electrical generators. These engines were capable of powering a MD-11, and they were running at full throttle most of the time. Outside the building you could barely hear a hum, due to all the baffles and mufflers. Plus, things like cruse ships and most big boats run on turbines, but you usually don't hear cruise ship goers complain about the engine noise...
Eric
Make it idiot-proof and someone will build a better idiot.
I don't think the US Army has any submarines.
Yeah, added an American flag
Of course, rumour has it that on the last run of the Queen Elizabeth the engineers wanted to really crack the engines wide open because they figured they could beat the SS United States ...
Unfortunately, manglement wouldn't let them ...
cross the atlantic in three days... sounds like my ping times :)
were you expecting to see a sig here? perhaps you'd rather see the inside of an ambulance!
I read about these about 4 years ago in popular mechanics or popular science. I don't remember which for sure. The ships themselves were designed by an engineering class at MIT. IIRC, they were able to achieve its efficiency in waves by making the hull slightly flexible, out of the same type of material airplane wings are made out of.
Spring is here. Don't believe me, look outside!
100 km? Last ship I drove was 53,000 tons and it took us about 1200 yards going from a standard bell to full stop. Get a clue before you post false data like that.
Sigh. Are we back to this again? Another dinosaur who thinks that using parts of your body as a unit of measurement is the way to go. Let's see: 12 inches in a foot, 3 feet in a yard, 5280 feet in a mile, 1760 yards in a mile. All very logical and easy-to-remember constants. Not.
I kept hearing a paln to make some kinf of marine museum with the SS United States and the USS New Jersey. They are on either side of Delaware river.
I happened to meet two people who traveled on the SS United States. One is an American (my landlord, a professor and a gold medalist in 1952 Olympic Games in sailing!) and the other a German (a woman who works at a port museum kind of place in Hamburg).
During the Cold War, the DoD was looking real hard into building a fleet of transport vessels that could go 50+ knots to outrun soviet subs through a tight corridor intensively patrolled by NATO ASW forces. No need for one now. Besides, nobody has ever made a profitable cargo carrier with gas turbine technology so dont expect this ship to be profitable either.
The heck with the boat... bring those engines out here to california - we could use them for power!
Pretty bad when large companies have build their own power plants cause the city refuses to build more that they need.
Interesting note: This boat seems to have the same series engine as the Boeing 777, the Rolls-Royce Trent. I don't know how these compare in actual fuel economy, but the ship carries 10,000 tons with five engines, while (I think) the plane carries only 20 tons with four.
.1 ton each, that makes 55 tons. I think the figures I have are for passenger planes. Maybe the total cargo capacity is close to 100 tons; that's still only one percent of the ship's capacity. If you factor in a 10x speed advantage for the plane, you still only get 10 percent of the ship's capacity for roughly the same fuel usage.
But that doesn't make sense - the 777 carries up to 550 passengers. At
---- "If we have to go on with these damned quantum jumps, then I'm sorry that I ever got involved" - Erwin Schrodinger
The hull form of the "Fastship" is basically a patrol craft type hull form, but just scaled up in size. Nothing really new there, despite the claims. And high speed cargo ships aren't all that new - SeaLand came out with the high speed SL-7 container ships around 30 years ago - they would do around 33 knots or so. They entered service not long before the first oil crisis, and were an economic disappointment, since they usually were run at much lower speeds because of the cost of fuel. (A ship's power requirement goes up roughly as a cubic power of the the speed, so lower speeds can provide significant fuel savings). A number of years ago, SeaLand sold (unloaded :) ) the SL-7s to the U.S. Navy, and were converted to rapid deployment ships.
Even though "FastShip" may take three days to cross the Atlantic, you still have to load and unload the ship. And the goods have to be trucked to/from the ports. So being 40-50% faster across doesn't translate into putting goods into your customers 40-50% faster overall. Some will feel that the actual time saved will be worth the premium shipping charges; but is there a large enough market?
From what I understand, this "Fastship" idea has been marketed for quite a number of years. But with oil prices at high prices, and with little evidence of future substantial lower prices, the idea may have a harder time of it to be sucessful.
If intelligent life is too complex to evolve on its own, who designed God?
A boat that fast will ensure that atlantic whales become extinct in decades!
as it is boats at 40 knots kill a lot of whales and are prob. responsible for the declining numbers of whales.
Also the noise may be whats responsible for whale strandings (the noise stuns them)
Bring back airships
Joseph.
I think that you got that wrong; a ship at hull speed is not riding it's own wave, it is sailing up it's own wave. Ships require a lot of power at hull speed because of this. Once they get over the hull speed (planing) the power requirement drops a bit but is still relatively high to that of a displacement type hull.
For displacement at low Froude numbers (dimensionless parameter: Fn=V^2/(g*L)) the power requirement is roughly proportional to the square of the velocity. At higher Froude numbers the effect of the ship sailing up it's own wave becomes greater and the power requirement becomes a lot higher. typically ships will have it's highest resistance when approaching hull speed...
Transportation by ship is much more efficient at low Froude numbers. Fast ships are relatively inefficient (Have you ever noticed the gas consumption for an outboard engine on a typical speed-boat ?). A good example of a displacement ship that often sails at near hull speed is a tug boat when it is not tugging anything; it has massive amounts of installed horsepower but a very short waterline length.
The record for transatlantic travel was by the SS United States 1959 wasn't it? Less than 72 hours I believe.
This resistance takes two forms pressure resistance and frictional resistance. Pressure resistance is the component of resistance which forms the waves where as viscous resistance is what is due to the friction effects of the hull passing through the water. As stated in the two articles the resistance changes depending on the vessels speed/length ratio or Froude number. This ratio is a none dimensional term used in fluids mechanics similar to the Reynolds number.
If Froude no. is plotted against speed the curve obtained has a series of peaks and troughs, low and high resistance's. for conventional displacement vessels you get a big trough at about 23 kts then a large peak. If you want to get over this peek you need to put a massive amount of power into the vessel. The problem is that as the speed increases, the frictional resistance increases by a power of 2 or something along those lines.
If you want to go fast you've got to reduce frictional resistance and the best war to do this is to get the hull out of the water. The 3 methods used by naval arch's are hovering, hydro foils and planing. A good book that goes through the principles involved is Mechanics of Marine Vehicles.
The planing hull work by the reaction force created by the passage of water along the underneath of the hull. The simple analogy is of an angled plate in a jet of water. As the plate moves through the water it gives rise to two forces, one horizontal (drag) and another vertical (lift). In the case of the fast ship the vertical force will lift at least part of the body out of the water therefore reducing the friction.
The disadvantage is that this will use a much larger amount of energy than a displacement ship, but it will provide an effective solution for a transportation system that is between a plane and conventional ship. Military application are limited by the noise it would produce, passive sonar seeing it from the other side of the Atlantic (a guess), and the fact none of there other ships would be able to keep up, so the worlds big navy's probably won't be placing orders just yet.
Tim
Tim
I'm no expert either, but I think Sonar has 2 modes - Active, as described above, and passive which involves listening.
Face it. Per unit of cubic space, transporting people earns far less money than transporting material goods.
If anyone has used the American rail system, they know this. Passenger trains are often shunted aside to wait for higher-value, but slower freight traffic to pass.
I wonder how much of the article was press release fodder. The claim that transporting objects typically takes 21 days is just BS. That probably includes red tape and loading, which the 3 day figure probably doesn't. My one experience in transatlantic travel took me 6 days on the fairly hefty QE2-- looking it up, it weighs 70,000 tons. Transporting 10,000 tons in 3 days is definitely an advance but I don't quite see anything revolutionary about it.
--LP
The Montreal (or is it the Quebec?, I forget), which is on display in Halifax could cross the Atlantic in 2 days. Monster Jet turbine engines powered this ship, and it was designed to hunt subs.
Built in the early 60s if I recall correctly, and only used twice - deemed too expensive to operate.
III.IIVIVIXIIVIVIIIVVIIIIXVIIIXIIIIIIIIVIIIIVVIII
Only now I realized that the only affordable way to transport different goods across the ocean is using a ship (airplanes can't be used to transport everything, they are too expensive). This only way usually takes 21 days and this is a great waste of time. FastShips will be able to change this situation - using them even at the very beginning will be 10 times cheaper than using an airplane. The company is going to manufacture four sea monsters and start the trial operations in the second half of 2002. The commercial operations will begin in early 2003.
This ship can hustle that emergency aid out to poor people faster and cheaper than in a plane, man. Much higher aid costs/transportation costs ratio with a Fastship.
Think about how much better earthquake-beleaguered India would be doing if 100 fastships made a beeline for it the day of.
-perdida
Goat sex free since 2001
The two "NGVs" that link mainland France with Corsica have a top speed of 37 kts, and carry 500 passengers, plus 148 cars.
NGVs
"but I'd sure prefer to travel to Europe one day by boat than plane"
I would have put it: "but I'd sure prefer to travel to America one day by boat than plane".
Sorry, that's my view of it.
The idea is to use the reflection effect which occurs if a ship moves along a linear channel. The front wave reflects off the channel walls and cancels out the rear wave thus cancelling out all energy loss.
But this only happens if you have ONE wave, not multiples ones a normal ship generates. So the scientists created a special ship shape whcih creates one single wave: a soliton wave. This wave bounces off the wall and cancels out the second (also soliton wave) generates at the end of the hull.
But in the sea you don't have a wall. So you need to take a wall with you. The trick is to cut the ship in 2 along the middle. Then put the left side on the right creating outside of the ship a flat surface. Inside you have a hollow passage with half a ship geometry on each side.
As this is symetrical, it's as if in the middle you had a virtual wall. This looks like a catamaran swallowing all water inside and producing no waves outside. Inside the wave is twice as big because the usual right and left waves are superposed.
I don't remember all details right now, here is the german text I found talking about the "supersonic" ship. http://www.spektrum.de/archiv/artikel.phtml?from=r echerche&artikel_id=4059
it has no pictures. All this is still at a theoretical stage.
Georges
Atari rules... ermm... ruled.
I wonder what kind of fuel efficiency these things will have. Must be pretty low to develop 335000hp.
And we thought we would run out of fossil fuel in 2050. Ha! Better make that 2025.
This is the kind of thing an army that needs to move a force quickly would love. It took 6 months to build up the force that invaded Iraq. With these ships, you could have probably cut two months off that time. Aircraft simply can't come close to moving the volume of material that ships can, and cutting 2 weeks off the time it takes to move a small army to someplace on the other side of the world has extremely significant strategic impact.
Of course, memory has a weight:size:cost ratio that facilitates this.
I've spent 36 hours on a train (Boston to New Orleans), and I know people who have ridden a bus from Boston to Los Angeles (3 days). If you get up and walk around every few hours, you'll be fine.
Put my clarinet beneath your bed 'till I get back in town.
When I went to Cozumel (a Mexican island off the coast of Cancun) on vacation, I took a ferry I think about 2 km to the mainland. Without Dramamine, I got seasick and vomited just before we docked. I realize that this ferry was much smaller than the boat in the article, would going across the ocean at this speed without Dramamine cause seasickness? Also, would it create large waves in its wake? BTW, I got some Dramamine for the way back... and it turned out fine (but it was tough reading the directions on how to take it in Spanish).
I sailed across the Atlantic in 1994, and I can say that a container ship moving at 20 knots is damn scary when you're going 7. So stay clear of the shipping lanes, you say? Yes, that's usually a good idea, but it can be a pretty big detour. We showed up on radar, but at sea when "there's no-one out there", very often the crews of ships will get lazy. We saw a few ships, and only managed to raise a third or so of them on radio. Why pay attention to the unchanging sea?
There's a water-jet catamaran ferry between, I think, Portland and Yarmouth, that goes something like 40 knots. Most ships hit whales from time to time, but this one doesn't give the whales a fighting chance. And the crew are so accustomed to the occasional thump of hitting a whale that when they ran down a fishing boat one day in a thick fog, they didn't even notice. Of course, no-one has any business fishing on the Grand Banks these days anyway, but still...
It's hard to dodge icebergs at 50 knots, too. Unlike any half-sane boat, ice absolutely doesn't show up on radar.
Yes, it'd be a nice trip, but I would have to question whether they'll find anyone whom I'd trust with such a dangerous vehicle.
"The biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place."
I guess you can develop efficient brakes for boats if the need comes. The problem would be the gigantic waves these boats could make. It will probably force them to keep the speed down close to land much in the way the Concorde had to stay at subsonic speeds over inhabited areas.
Let's just hope they do some thinking in advance and won't accept any fuel consumption just to go a faster.
>How much noise does a hurricane make?
R RRRRRRRRRRR`.
Little ones go `weeeoughghghhhh`, larger ones go `RRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
>Boats are small compared to nature.
You are quite correct. Nature is much bigger than a boat.
But the point is, dolpins in the Jiang Tse have become deaf due to noise surrounding them, which certainly does not originate from hurricanes.
Of course, the ocean is much bigger...
Nevertheless, one should always be aware of possible problems.
"Between strong and weak, between rich and poor [...], it is freedom which oppresses and the law which sets free"
Wouldn't you just love to be a whale or a dolphin out playing in the waves when this thing comes by.
The SS United States was the brainchild of one of the world's foremost marine architects, William Francis Gibbs. His dream was to build a passenger ship that was faster, safer and more technologically advanced than anything else afloat. It was truly a construction project that challenged conventional thinking. In 1952, his dream became a reality when the SS United States crossed the North Atlantic in 3 days, 10 hours and 42 minutes averaging 35.59 knots (65.48 km/hr or 40.96 mph). The design characteristics encompassing the United States read straight out of a James Bond novel, many remaining classified by the Navy well into the late 70's:
To read more go to S.S. United States Homepage.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Instead of rushing aid to these areas at high cost (and ironically, environmental damage) after an emergency, how about less glamourous, cheaper, long term support for these regions?
Apparently a lot of the problem in India was that buildings were poorly built for an earthquake region so a lot more fell down than should have. After the quake, there wasn't enough capacity in the local hospitals to help.
Now this isn't as glamourous as a bunch of FastShips or AmericanAidTransportSuperPlanes or whatever, but how about Western countries helping developing nations by having a few more paid educators and advisors in these places all the time? Compared to the air fuel or development costs of Fast Ships, how about a few building regulations managers and nursing lecturers to help these countries develop their infrastructures to prepare for crises. It's always cheaper to prepare for crises than to clean up after them. Developing these regions so they have well built buildings, eathquake monitoring, evacuation planning, hospitals with trained staff to cope with emergencies... this must be cheaper in the long term than the clean up. I'm really not sure that throwing another costly high tech solution at the problem will solve it.
This has been done before, albeit on a smaller scale. There is (was?) a passenger service in the Vancouver / Victoria BC (Canada) area that uses a high speed craft as well, though not nearly these speeds. It is great for open water, but once it get's anywhere near a shoreline it was forced down to regular speeds as the wake produced by such a craft at such speeds is tremendous.
Joe McGuire
tinfoil.music
tinfoilmedia
The same thing has been said about the noise that airguns towed behind seismic research vessels (using seismic method to map stratigraphy/look for oil) make, and it is an equally wrong argument.
Your argument makes sense initially, after all, how could marine life possibly enjoy large noises? But once you get out there on the ocean, you'll notice that the marine life really don't give a damn.
I worked on a seismic boat last summer where the same kinds of worries were voiced, and let me assure you that the dolphins and whales follow us around like we're interesting, not threatening, to them. The noise is a source of interest to them, if it were painful/harmful they wouldn't follow us around.
In 14 days of sailing, we had to change course five or six times to avoid collisions with tankers and other large shipping vessels. A fast ship would have made this impossible. On the open ocean, you can't see farther than about 4 miles around you (that dang curved earth thing). A large, fast moving ship would plow through anything less than 100' long because it wouldn't even notice them and they wouldn't be high enough to see it coming.
-m
Of course the article is old (10/97?) and states that service between Philedelphia and Europe should start in 2000. I guess they are a bit behind their earlier estimates. The computerized photo on ZZZ is has more detail than the computerized photo at SciAm, so I guess they have done something in 3.5 years.
According to the inventor's article on the Scientific American site, the FastShip really does plane. He calls it a "semi-planing" hull. This occurs becuase the FastShip has slight concavity to its hull in the stern. Supposedly, this lifts the stern and helps eliminate drag. Oh yes, I would imagine that any ship that can carry cargo would be able to handle passengers as well, but what passengers want to make that trip?
Zorn
/ is the root of
Seems that a boat with multiple high-power turbines moving a 750' hull at 50mph would make a hell of a racket. Has anyone considered the amount of damage this noise level would do to ambient marine life (particularly large marine mammals)? Would any environmentally-conscious nation allow this to operate in its waters? It seems like this design might make most of the crossing in a short time, but spend several days slowly coming into and leaving each port. Hmm.
my $0.02
Jon
I think not...(*poof*)
The big ships today already take 100km to slowdown before the coast. And as we all know E=(m/2)v this boats will take even more, not taking into account the less friction from the higher keel line.
Will these boats be manoeuvreble? Will they be able to cross the atlantic without hitting some iceberg or some ground or other ships or shreddering whales?
What sound will they make? I guess the sound under water will carry around the globe.
Sorry for potentially posting questions answered in the article, but the link doesn't work for me today, as a big part of the net (couldn't even reach w3.org and kde.org)
Just because I can imagine doing a hippopotamus, doesn't mean I'd like to do it.
rr
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur.
...an ekranoplan
Two...the 777 has only two engines. The 707 and 747 are the only jet airliners from Boeing that used/use four engines. (The 727 used three engines, and the 737, 757, and 767 use two.)
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
Is it just me or does a lot of the stuff in the ZZZ archive sound like supervillian supplies - superfast ships, mesicopters, exoskeletons, laser freezing guns, personal robotic assistants, microsubmarines, smart dust, etc., etc.
Maybe we should send in 007 and/or the JLA to check it out? Or better yet The Authority:)
"Bugger this, I want a better world." - Jenny Sparks
The technology required to cross the atlantic in 3 days has been around for almost 40 years.
The USS Enterprise (CVN-65) was commissioned in 1963. It happens to be nuclear, but two other ships in it's class are oil burners they are the USS Kenedy and the USS America.
This class of aircraft carrier displaces 80,000 tons, can carry a crew complement of over 5,000 people plus 120 airplanes. Janes book of fighting ships list the top speed of the carriers at 35+ knots. During desert storm, the USS Kenedy left Norfolk, VA on a Thursday (sorry, don't remember the exact date.) One of my best friends was on board. He called me from Turkey on Sunday at noon and told me they'd been in port for almost 12 hours. Thursday, Friday, Saturday, sure sounds like 3 days to cross the Atlantic AND the Mediteranian.
Of course from what I've heard, it costs in excess of $1 million per day to cruise at that speed, but it has and is still being done today by the US Navy.
--- Have you seen MURL?
that's still hanging around from 1912.
Aide: Grant drinks too much to command an army. Lincoln: Find out what he drinks and give it to my other generals!
http://www.cargolifter.com/
Only 160 tonnes, nowhere near 10,000 tonnes but it will be the 1st of its kind.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
When I first read this, I thought the first customer would be the military.
When the shit hits the fan, the US can airlift units to just about anywhere in the world with the C-141 Starlifter. You can transport alot of infantry, and some light tanks, but I don't think you can transport much of the big stuff like M1A1 or some of the big artillary. I could be wrong, and you may be able to fit those into a Starlifter, but I'm sure you can't fit that many at a time.
So the US has the capability to rapidly deploy basic military units in a short amount of time, but it's gotta be a bitch to support those units by just air. Food, ammo, and other supplies take up alot of space and weight. Supporting units by just air is mostly impractical. That's why the US stores heavy mechanized units (tanks and artillary) and supplies in many parts of the world, just so half the equipment is already there.
But if they had the capability to deploy massive amounts of equipment and supplies within days notice to anywhere in the world, then the effectiveness of many units such as the Marine Rapid Deployment Force would be greatly enhanced.
I wouldn't be surprised if the US military wasn't one of the first customers, if not a major sponsor of the development of this technology.
On a side note...
An old friend who worked in the engine room on the USS Enterprise (aircraft carrier) said that when they wanted to, they could haul ass in that thing - I mean 50+ knots. They don't do it often, and they don't advertise it, but he's seen them going so fast that the wake from the bow was shooting ABOVE the flight deck (which if you've seen an aircraft carrier in person, is WAY up there). Don't know how true this is, but I believe my friend. To think of that HUGE ship moving that fast IS amazing.
Glutious
Jeremy
"Opinions are like assholes; everyone's got one..."
Why are we still working with "boats" why not look into developing matter transporters? I agree with the damage that could case to marine life. Hell even air planes are a risk because birds get sucked up into the engines. Perhaps these fast boats are the solution. And I think Airships should have been furthered as vaible transport.
___________
I don't care what it looks like, it WORKS doesn't it!?!