Alien Movie Universe

PROMETHEUS spacecraft is really FAST

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Bladerunner70

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 12:59 AM
Wow, that is one fast Spacecraft! If my numbers are correct, the PROMETHEUS was traveling [b]34.64011428209031 times the speed of light[/b] to reach LV223. Here's my math: 327,000,000,000,000 = 327 trillion kilometers to LV223 327 trillion kilometers x 0.621371192 to convert Km to Miles 203,188,379,784,000 miles Speed of Light = 186,000 miles per second Distance light travels in one day = 186,000 x 3600 x 24 = 16,070,400,000 16,070,400,000 x 365 = 5,865,696,000,000 miles (distance light travels in one year) Therefore: 203188379784000 / 5865696000000 = 34.64011428209031 years to travel @ speed of light to LV223. Did one of the crew state they were in hypersleep for 2.5 years? That's fast. And isn' the system LV223 is supposed to be in "realatively" close to earth?
29 Replies

LordSoth

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 1:15 AM
Pfft that's nothing, The Event Horrizon did it in a few minutes :)

Prenihility

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 1:15 AM
F***in' A.

abordoli

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 1:45 AM
34.64011428209031 is how many light years LV-223 is from Earth. The Prometheus made it in, what, 2 years. It had a FTL (Faster Than Light) propulsion system. It was travelling at [b]Warp Factor 17.32!!!!!![/b] [url=http://www.affordablehousinginstitute.org/blogs/us/star_trek_scotty_small.jpg][img]http://www.affordablehousinginstitute.org/blogs/us/star_trek_scotty_small.jpg[/img][/url] [size=6][b]“She canna take much more o this, Captain!”[/b][/size]

Kronnang Dunn

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 2:04 AM
Hyperspace anyone?

Hadley's Hope

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 2:07 AM
I was about to point that out Antony... Forgot to divide by the amount of time it actually took. Also the time was 2 years 4 months and 18 days... so it left Aug 3rd 2019 (871 days later... Div by standard year 365.25 gives us 2.3844668036 years, to go 3.27 x 10^14km That works out an average of 1.37126 * 10^ 14 km per year to make the trip and div by one light year, 9,460,730,472,580.8 km gives us 14.48 times the speed of light.

abordoli

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 2:19 AM
Warp Factor 14.48!!! Scotty will be pleased. the dilithium crystals were about to explode.... ; )

NoXWord

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 2:19 AM
@Bladerunner70 regarding the "relatively close" statement, the "relatively" is the key. It depends on the scale you consider. If you think the Moon is close, then 35LY are very very very far, but if you consider interstellar travel (and that's what we are talking about) then the closest star to our Sun is about 4LY away, so Zeta2 Ret is less than 10 times further. Considering that our galaxy (the family we belong to, basically) is 100,000LY across, 35LY are a ridiculously small amount, and definitely worth the expression "relatively close" ;) [img]http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-sKBnwNpRZqk/Ta7XuQMlU2I/AAAAAAAACmo/fDiGXUWF0HM/s1600/ludicrous+speed.jpg[/img]
Ridley Scott will eventually tell us how the Queen was born. Right now we have the Deacon; coming soon the Mercury, the May and the Taylor.

relative

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 7:59 AM
Your reference frames are wrong. They traveled 34.5 light years in ~2 [i]ship[/i] years, not earth years. No faster than light travel. 3.27 * 10 ^14 Km = 34.56 Light years according to Google it took them 2 years, 4 months, 18 days, 36 (ship) hours. (=2.38 years) Factor of change = 34.56 / 2.38 = 14.52 so they were traveling at 0.9976256066302674 the speed of light If they did a round trip, it would take them ~68.8 [i]Earth years[/i] but only ~4.8 [i]ship years[/i]. So when they got back, they would be 4.8 years older, and everyone who stayed on earth would be 68.8 years older.

relative

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 7:59 AM
Your reference frames are wrong. They traveled 34.5 light years in ~2 [i]ship[/i] years, not earth years. No faster than light travel. 3.27 * 10 ^14 Km = 34.56 Light years according to Google it took them 2 years, 4 months, 18 days, 36 hours in the ships frame of reference (=2.38 years) Factor of change = 34.56 / 2.38 = 14.52 so they were traveling at 0.9976256066302674 the speed of light If they did a round trip, it would take them ~68.8 [i]Earth years[/i] but only ~4.8 [i]ship years[/i]. So when they got back, they would be 4.8 years older, and everyone who stayed on earth would be 68.8 years older.

Bladerunner70

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 8:07 AM
Yeah, I couldn't remember how long David had told Vickers they'd been asleep? But WTF is a 'ship' year? Thanks.

Sesquatch

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 8:26 AM
@Bladerunner70: check out special relativity, and this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_dilation

allinamberclad

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 8:32 AM
@Kronnang Dunn No, "Hyperspace" - they seemed very clear to set this up on the whole Weyland background thing that this was FTL technology.... Just saying. It hardly seems something worthy of the attention, anymore.

Bladerunner70

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 8:39 AM
Do any of you think WE will ever be able to travel interstellar space at anywhere near that speed? Obviously I am not a science/tech guy and I cannot give you any data that supports or refutes the idea of travel at or beyond the speed of light, but the idea seems extremely unlikely at best to me? Here's my thoughts on this kind of travel/technology development: We have sooo many problems to solve here on earth; over-population, climate change, H20 shortages, wars over resources/oil, etcetera. And the resources needed to travel and explore space beyond the moon, let alone our solar system seems extremely silly. As well, what would we hope to accomplish in this kind of travel/exploration? Minerals? Oil? H20? Why go somewhere else when we have all we need right here on earth? IMO, we would need to get our house in order here first before WE attempt these silly space exploration attempts at huge, huge, huge, societal costs. But what do I know? I thought PROMETHEUS was facking awesome! Can't wait for the Blu-Ray to come out.

Bladerunner70

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 8:44 AM
I suppose if WE could go back in time say 150 years, and explain to someone from that time, WE would be able to build a metal bird weighing 1/2 million pounds, that could travel at 600 miles/hr @ 35,000 ft, we would be declared insane in no time. Not to mention the fact that within 70 years we/technology went from the Wright Bros. flight to the moon and back?

Hadley's Hope

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 9:16 AM
@Relative. I admire that you took the time to work out the time dilation and it's relation to c.... BUT. You have overlooked the likely consequences for this crew if they cannot exceed c, using something like Hyperspace, and have the ability to get from A to b @ v >c and also send messages across light years, without waiting years for a reply. It would render it pointless for anyone to make such a trip and expect to ever see most of their friends and family again, as they would have died of old age. you could say that I'm dealing in "ifs" and "buts" ... so lets look at observed data re a ship in operation working up until 2122. The Nostromo. It has a crew member called Ellen Ripley. They've been out WAY past Zeta 2 Reticuli hauling ore (I think from some place called Thedus.) which took them 16 months to get to. By using your logic, she's been gone about 70 Earth years... and yet, she has a dughter on Earth, and she has promised to be home for her 11th Birthday. Somehow I doubt that the daughter and husband are in stasis waiting for her. Also, Hadleys Hope. Colony control room conversation (34.5 light years from Earth) "I don't ask. You know why I don't ask? cos it takes TWO WEEKS to get an answer, and the answer is always "Don't ask!" " No time dilation there... the planet is not going near light speed. So they must have communications that also bypass the light speed barrier. And what exactly would be the pound of rushing some marines out there ona rescue mission that takes 34 years? Newt Jorden would either be long dead or be 40 years old. Not meaning to hammer home a point (although it could be contagious from the Lindelhof-Spaight script)

bholland83

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 8:15 PM
I was looking for the distance from Earth to LV223 that was captioned in the movie and found your post! My dad is an astronomer and just to humour ourselves were curious to determine how far this fictional location was supposed to be from Earth. Based on your information, it's about 35 light years away which, in the galactic scheme of things is NOTHING considering our galaxy is roughly 100,000 light years wide!!! 35 light years away, for example, is the distance to the star Arcturus. Regarding your math, however, am I mistaken that they actually traveled at 17 times the speed of light to go the distance of 34 years in 2 years? Do you remember exactly how long it took them? it was roughly 2 years right?

bholland83

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 8:16 PM

bholland83

MemberOvomorphJun-11-2012 8:16 PM

Ausar

MemberOvomorphOct-30-2012 9:11 AM
I was looking for the distance from Earth to LV223 that was captioned in the movie and found your post! My dad is an astronomer and just to humour ourselves were curious to determine how far this fictional location was supposed to be from Earth. Based on your information, it's about 35 light years away which, in the galactic scheme of things is NOTHING considering our galaxy is roughly 100,000 light years wide!!! 35 light years away, for example, is the distance to the star Arcturus. Regarding your math, however, am I mistaken that they actually traveled at 17 times the speed of light to go the distance of 34 years in 2 years? Do you remember exactly how long it took them? it was roughly 2 years right? Hmmmmm interesting .... the apparent /effective velocity is 14.48c reflective to the time dilation factor. Therefore what's being calculated when the rate distance(d) over time(t),(d=34.5 years and t=2.383months, or v=d/t gives a equivalent or an effective velocity of 14.48c. Note this is not the actual velocity other wise time travel to the pass would occur when traving faster than the speed of light.This 14.48c represents a space time curvature factor on how much the geometry of space time is being curved. This is the equivalent of the relativistic time dilation where v=c(1-(t'/T)^2)^1/2. This will give the actual velocity of the star ship of 0.997612c. From this other factors must be considered. The energy use, the mass of the star ship and its' occupense because the closer the velocity is to the speed of light the more massive the ship becomes therefore the more energy is needed. Once you reach 1c you would have used up all the energy in the universe. Therefore speed itself should not be the factor to travel far distance star systems. Wormhole/warp drive/teleportation.These are all mathematically sound but the technology of this type 0 civilization has not been developed yet.

Sendercorp

MemberOvomorphNov-08-2012 6:35 PM
Ladies and Gents Dear Fans , I am sorry Prometheus never , did go to LV 223 . It was all staged , lights camera and etc . Zeta Reticuli star system 40 light years away in distance . Prometheus ,ship logs 2 years travel time . she must have traveled approx 20 times the speed of light . Twenty times of the speed of light . For ST fans it is Warp factor 2.5 H O W ? Now we assume Wayland must have above ,top secret GAP in the script or yes , or a proper star drive which can easily manipulate all norm and exotic gravity and space fabric . Because their power generator can output only spring time lightning worth of jolt to power 4 VTOL nuclear ION plasma engines to produce push force . Lets give them an extra Power plant to rapit fire ten times more power to jolt up two extra ION matter drives to produce more push force ( That comes with LSS and TDS life support system and Time dilation sequencer ) still YET they cannot go quarter of the way . So where is the true FTL HEART of Prometheus . Is there one ? If you need to go to LV 223 in less than a year . You need a fine tuned STARDRIVE period . We do have proper solutions . Our Stardrives ,fold drives, and Oserapheem drives are well tested time after time . We are Sendercorp ,we bring peace to multiverse .

Indy John

MemberOvomorphNov-10-2012 5:42 AM
If I add Oserapheem drive to my Lamborghini would the gas milage improve?
Be choicelessly aware as you move through life

Ausar

MemberOvomorphNov-15-2012 7:21 PM
Okay lets's arrive to LV 223 in less than a year. I fact; how about 7 hours ,7 a good number. No need to spend 2.383 years in suspended animation. Does your Oserapheem drives do TRANSWARP , Quantum Non-locality jumps and time travel ? You may have a buyer.

mark weyland

MemberOvomorphDec-27-2012 6:34 PM
Just watched Prometheus again on Blu Ray and saw this interesting discussion. I think Prometheus was traveling Faster Than Light (FTL). I don't think the writers took into account that traveling close to the speed of light slows down time for the occupants of the space craft. They still speak of Earth Year 2093. If it was 2 ship years, wouldn't 34 Earth Years have passed and be the year 2125? It's Science fiction. Also, just to point out, 14.5 times the speed of light is not warp factor 14.5. Warp Factors have changed over the years as writers realize how big the galaxy is, but a common conversion is warp factor squared. That is, warp factor 1 is 1 times the Speed of Light, warp 2 is 4x, warp 3 is 9x etc. So 14.48 or 14.52 times the S.o. L. is Warp 3.8.

CRYSiiSx2

MemberOvomorphDec-28-2012 3:21 AM
I made a thread about this a few months back. But in all reality, traveling that fast and that far would seem like a short time in the ship, but on Earth it would have been many many years.
[IMG]http://i46.tinypic.com/3502zc9.png[/IMG]

BLANDCorporatio

MemberOvomorphDec-28-2012 9:17 AM
I love how we go all physics on this stuff ([url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twin_paradox#Difference_in_elapsed_times:_how_to_calculate_it_from_the_ship]though you may want to look up the Twin Paradox and how to calculate the time difference between Earth and ship crew, because the acceleration profile is what matters[/url]). But, MAGIC. The Nostromo, according to AvP wiki, is an FTL ship. There's FTL in the Alien Universe. Deal with it. As another poster suggested, many things in the plots of Alien and Aliens do not make sense unless you realize some form of FTL travel, including communication, is possible. Similar considerations apply for the Prometheus mission. I think that looking over promotional websites for the film, which would count as extended canon, even list that FTL travel was invented by the Weyland corp. at some point before the Prometheus expedition was launched. So, we have FTL. Any calculation based on present day experimentally established known physics (which includes Spec. Rel.) is thus as useful as a sniper scope on a knife. It doesn't apply. So you may as well postulate that 2 ship years are the same as 2 Earth years. [i]There is no compelling physical reason to reject this, because you've rejected physics to begin with.[/i] And that's tolerated, for FTL. As the motto goes, "You want it, the readers want it, everybody does it, it's ok."
The whole point of this is lost if you keep it a secret.

LostInPlace

MemberOvomorphOct-08-2016 7:28 PM

Not sure if anyone addressed this but according to Albert Einstein the problem with traveling at light speed is that time passes differently for the folk back home than it does for the crew. Someone had mentioned that it would have taken seventy earth years to get to one of the LV's. But I've read that the theory of a warp drive is that by warping the space around the ship you can somehow curtail the differences in passing time so that a three year voyage traveling with a warp drive would be closer to three years back on earth. It's crazy but scientist actually believe that one day we will be able to do this. All the people here may never see this but give us another hundred years(providing we don't destroy ourselves first) and our great-great-great- grandchildren may be vacationing at the a Disney Resort on one of the LV planets. I'm sorry if someone had already mentioned this, I didn't read all the comments and I'm sorry if my science isn't right because I got most of it from a Discovery show and a show about Star Trek tech. But not bad for a house painter I thought!

Savage1701

MemberOvomorphSep-05-2021 12:16 PM

Yes, but in the Alien universe their FTL causes time expansion, not time dilation, right?

This explains why they have to be in hyper sleep.  If they were not, the subjective duration of their voyage would be decades, while to an outside observer, only about 2.5 years would pass.  It doesn't matter for David, because he does not age. But the rest of the crew would age tremendously. And the faster they push their FTL, the longer their subjective duration is. That is what keeps an upward boundary on how fast they can go.  Even asleep, their ship can't sustain them forever. As I understand it, that was also the reason that Ripley's daughter only aged at a normal rate while she was asleep on the Nostromo.  But when Ripley went into hypersleep aboard the sublight lifeboat, she did not age, while her daughter aged another 65 years or so and died of cancer before Ripley could ever see her again. 

FTL time expansion makes it a lot easier to explain the Alien universe and its passage of time. It keeps the problem of aging confined to the ship's crew, rather than applying to all of the outside observers, and pretty much lets everyone age almost in parallel, although I guess if you spent all of your career in hypersleep, you would age less than everybody else. 

hox

MemberFacehuggerSep-05-2021 9:36 PM

You have that the wrong way round. On a very fast moving ship (let’s say 99.99% the speed of light), the occupants would age very little from our perspective. From their perspective, we would age much more quickly. It’s the classic Twins Paradox in relativity. A twin who travels very far very fast will come home to find his sibling long dead.

We don’t know how quickly the Narcissus was moving with respect to Earth, but it was described as “drifting” at the start of Aliens. So maybe time dilation didn’t play much of a part in Ripley’s ageing process. It’s quite possible that the hypersleep chamber, the “old freezerinos” just slowed down her metabolism to next to nothing. 57 years in chill might not be that long.

By the way, there’s no such thing as time expansion, but time dilation is very real.

BigDave

MemberDeaconSep-06-2021 5:09 AM

Well i could NOT have PUT it any better than HOX has, as that was the same as my Reply would have been...

As FAR as the Prometheus goes it was Traveling at about 19X the Speed of Light, as we go on in the Franchise then Ships Get Faster..... the Nostromo could Travel at 47X the Speed of Light.  The Sulaco like 780X (give or take).

The Covenant  about 33X the Speed of Light.

R.I.P Sox  01/01/2006 - 11/10/2017

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