Really powerful A- wings

[vengence]

I was observing some effects from this scene.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RW_hGOFukMQ

These are the things I observed.

1. 2 A-Wings were able to, in one strafing run, destroy one of the Unshielded shield towers on the executor SSD. Conclusion the A-wings weapons are powerful enough to do significant damage to critical systems on or near the surface of an unshielded ship.

2. when the A- wing crashes through the bridge it's effect goes all the way through from one end to the other, as seen at the time stamp 0:28. Some quick math indicates that the bridge section is roughly 142 meters long. Conclusion a collision with an A-wing is destructive enough to be able to gut a frigate(most SW frigates are roughly 150 m in length).

I am curious about other peoples thoughts on these.

[FTeik]

There is little sense in putting armour on a sensor-dome and - IIRC - the A-Wings on the attack on the Executor-domes used their missiles. We have already seen in ANH, what X-Wing lasers can do to the unshielded hull of the DeathStar.
As for the bridge exploding after being rammed by an A-Wing, well, those fighters carry enough energy to fly combat for an hour with multiple laser-shots in the low kiloton-range and go to hyperspace. So all of that going of at once makes a pretty large BOOOM.

[Rekkon]

Also, the A-wing hit after the Executor lost its bridge deflector shield. Had that not happened, we have every reason to believe Mr. Arvel would have gone splat outside Piett's window with no damage to the hull, just as happened with the one Y-wing that got shot up and crashed into a regular Star Destroyer.

[Patroklos]

1.) We have no idea what fire the Executor in general and the area of the bridge in particular sustained before that scene. It explicitly says they were going to focus the Rebel fleet's fire on the Executor and since the scene sequence is not necessarily in real time we have no idea who exactly got to shoot at her or for how long.

2.) We don't see an A-wing go through the bridge tower. The sceen is canted to look at the forward face of the bridge and all we see from the back side is a relatively small fire ball that appears several seconds after the initial awing hit (if it want through the bridge it did it at slow motion, so it didn't). There are several other secondary explosions around the bridge tower that are not in a direct line from the A-wing's impact, so there is no reason to thing the fire ball in the rear is any different from those.

[Vance]

We have already seen in ANH, what X-Wing lasers can do to the unshielded hull of the DeathStar.

Aye, absolutely nothing .

Once those large multi-dozen meter wide explosions dissipate we see that there is no damage on the surface of the Death Star. The only times we see them inflict damage is when they destroyed that large tower, and when some of those laser cannons get blown up which was presumably due to energy getting through their firing windows - not the armour.

As for the bridge exploding after being rammed by an A-Wing, well, those fighters carry enough energy to fly combat for an hour with multiple laser-shots in the low kiloton-range and go to hyperspace. So all of that going of at once makes a pretty large BOOOM.

What evidence is there for kiloton range lasers in the films or TCW?

[Batman]

So just out of idle curiosity, those multi-dozen metre wide explosions that you allege did beans to the Death Star surface resulted from-what, exactly?
Since as per your allegation that it 'wasn't the Death Star surface being vapourized, where prey tell did those explosions come from?

Fighters go routinely and repeatedly beyond orbital velocity in the movies alone but yeah, how cold they possibly carry fuel with a high enough energy density to make a really big bang? Preposterous!

[Vance]

I don't know; but when they cleared there was no damage where the bolts struck. The latter point was not questioning whether fighters could go beyond orbital velocity or even explode with a big bang, but rather where the poster got the kiloton per shot feats from. We see plenty of starfighters crash and explode in planetary atmospheres and it is always less explosive than a nuclear bomb, so the explosions which engulfed and utterly penetrated the entire command structure must have been a secondary result triggered by the fighters collision. By the time the fighter crash through the blast door separating the command deck from the rest of the structure it was probably already destroyed; it could not have literally flown through the entire construct and out of the other side.

There is nothing super-powerful or out of the ordinary about the ramming or the bombing performed by the A-wings.

[Batman]

We never actually 'saw' those parts of the Death Star's surface afterwards. We see bolts strike and cause a lot of sparks but no visible damage but we never see the area where they cause the explosions afterwards. Not to mention that single figure KT is massively less than what you get by downscaling from the Death Star.
We don't see a single fighter crash and explode inside an atmosphere in any of the movies so I can only assume you're talking about TCW. So what? Those fighters must carry enough highly energetic fuel to get them to orbit in seconds, and just because that fuel doesn't always catastrophically release that energy doesn't mean it never will.

And I can't recall the A-Wings bombing anything in the movies?

[Vance]

We did see those parts of the surface afterwards, in a couple of the shots. I can go get the screenshots if they are needed.

We do see a starfighter crash in atmosphere in the films. The Naboo fighter in A Phantom Menace.

The A-wings launch about ten proton torpedoes into the sensor / shield dome.

[Patroklos]

Why are we assuming those were proton torpeadoes rather than normal lasers? Is that an EU reference?

So just out of idle curiosity, those multi-dozen metre wide explosions that you allege did beans to the Death Star surface resulted from-what, exactly?
Since as per your allegation that it 'wasn't the Death Star surface being vapourized, where prey tell did those explosions come from?

Star Wars, and the battle of Endor in particular, is full of energy weapon bolts causing explosions against fully shielded vessels. Vaporizing hull is apparently not a requirement for causing an explosion.

[Rekkon]

A-wings carry concussion missiles, not proton torpedoes.

[Andras]

I can't find my novelization right now, but IIRC if you cross reference the novelization w the movie, the A-Wings were carrying Protorps.

[Batman]

And firing them at the 'bridge', not the globe thingies. Also triggering a sequence of events we simply do not see in the movie. And while the visual differences between lasers, protorps and concussion missiles are...let's say ill-defined, those did look like standard laser blasts (for the Wars definition of laser).

[Rogue 9]

And firing them at the 'bridge', not the globe thingies. Also triggering a sequence of events we simply do not see in the movie. And while the visual differences between lasers, protorps and concussion missiles are...let's say ill-defined, those did look like standard laser blasts (for the Wars definition of laser).

Though they emitted from the missile tubes, not the wingtip cannons.