New Evidince(photon torpedo releated.)

[Durandal]

Shockwaves in space act differently then in the atmosphere. Where as nuclear reactions create large fireballs and huge shockwaves, anti-matter reactions are just energy releasing events IIRC.

They release energy through the same mechanism, genius. A fusion bomb converts matter into energy, just like a matter/anti-matter bomb. The latter is simply a more efficient means of doing so. If we detonated a matter/anti-matter bomb in our atmosphere of the same yield as a fusion bomb, both would create mushroom clouds and pressure shockwaves.

Please refrain from trying to bullshit your way through this.

[Darth Wong]

Shockwaves in space act differently then in the atmosphere.

This was not vacuum. Vacuum is not filled with visible material, and a hydrogen release into vacuum will scatter too rapidly to combust.

Where as nuclear reactions create large fireballs and huge shockwaves, anti-matter reactions are just energy releasing events IIRC.

Durandal already covered this; please refrain from bluffing your way through things.

[His Divine Shadow]

TDiC

By far the most useless example, no fireball, no nothing except a physics defying shockwave, it almost looks like it hit a shield of some kind.

Broken Link

Never seen it, please explain?

Skin of Evil

This one is actually rather good(Ted C I think got a 110MT photon torp from this), though the wildcard here is the presence of a shuttlecraft, and the possible amount of matter/antimatter it might carry.

[Darth Wong]

How can you get a 110MT photon torpedo from a yellow fireball which doesn't even last one full second, when a 1 MT explosion fireball is white-hot and lasts for at least 20 seconds?

[Stravo]

Gentlemen, the explosive was enriched Tutritium (whatever the fuck that is) as O'Brien CLEARLY states in the episode. PLEASE stop making shit up when referring to these episodes. He clearly states it and I used it as a reference for Starcrossed when the Feds used it to try and severly damage a Stardestroyre in the Battle for Earth.

This is OBVIOUSLY NOT an antimatter raection but some exotic material.

[His Divine Shadow]

How can you get a 110MT photon torpedo from a yellow fireball which doesn't even last one full second, when a 1 MT explosion fireball is white-hot and lasts for at least 20 seconds?

I don't know, never did the calculation, never seen the episode.

[Darth Wong]

Gentlemen, the explosive was enriched Tutritium (whatever the fuck that is) as O'Brien CLEARLY states in the episode. PLEASE stop making shit up when referring to these episodes. He clearly states it and I used it as a reference for Starcrossed when the Feds used it to try and severly damage a Stardestroyre in the Battle for Earth.

This is OBVIOUSLY NOT an antimatter raection but some exotic material.

Since nothing can generate more energy per unit mass than M/AM, that hardly increases its firepower.

[The Silence and I]

Maybie in Skin of Evil the torpedo was detonated in the extreme upper atmosphere, where the lingering visible fireball would not apply. I have no idea why they would do this instead of directly targeting the shuttle, but I can't buy a KT yield explosion from this episode for one simple reason: When I scaled the explosion, assuming an Earth diameter for the planet, I found it was ~400 KM in diameter... How could any KT explosion do that?

[Durandal]

Fine, then I'll stop calling you a liar if you simply admit that "Night Terrors" was a demonstration of poor firepower and that you were wrong.

[Alyeska]

Fine, then I'll stop calling you a liar if you simply admit that "Night Terrors" was a demonstration of poor firepower and that you were wrong.

I admit that I donn't know as much about explossives as I first thought.

Now this stops here.

[seanrobertson]

I remember the blast in "A Time To Stand."

The actual bomb only blew up the little building that sat on
the asteroid. The really dangerous blast didn't occur for
several seconds afterwards. So the ultritium didn't actually
blow the asteroid apart; something else, supposedly weapons
or power sources deep inside the white facility, did.

[kojikun]

when a 1 MT explosion fireball is white-hot and lasts for at least 20 seconds?

I knew I loved nukes for a reason.

Since nothing can generate more energy per unit mass than M/AM, that hardly increases its firepower.

Light has no mass but has energy so its e/m ratio is infinity ::poketty::

[CmdrWilkens]

when a 1 MT explosion fireball is white-hot and lasts for at least 20 seconds?

I knew I loved nukes for a reason.

Since nothing can generate more energy per unit mass than M/AM, that hardly increases its firepower.

Light has no mass but has energy so its e/m ratio is infinity ::poketty::

Not quite, its actually an unreal number, its only infinity if you are taking the limit as M -> 0. At 0 itself the number becomes unreal.

[Chris OFarrell]

I remember the blast in "A Time To Stand."

The actual bomb only blew up the little building that sat on
the asteroid. The really dangerous blast didn't occur for
several seconds afterwards. So the ultritium didn't actually
blow the asteroid apart; something else, supposedly weapons
or power sources deep inside the white facility, did.

And I don't actualy think it was as much of a two stage detonation as you think. From what I remember, there was the detonation which blew out from one of the buildings on the surface, the explosion quickly covered the entire screen in a few frames then we went back to the bridge. Sisko told Dax to punch it and we get an external view of the explosion expanding and consuming the base before it reaches a size that flings a shockwave of vapor and debres everywhere which caught their ship and crippled it.

Not that two stage explosives are unprecedented in Star Trek. When Voyager fired Tricobolt torpedoes at the Caretaker array, they impacted with a reletivly minimal bang. Then a few seconds later a second effect took place and grew until it ripped the array appart.

But I highly dobut that O'Brien was lying about the numbers he gave given that everyone bassed their survival DIRECTLY off them and consdered the explosive shockwave a clear and present danger to their very survival. Even if the explosion was a two stage one, its far more likly the bomb simply works on a two stage effect of some kind rather then it being several hundred or thousand times less powerful then everyone was claiming and expecting.

[Darth Wong]

And I don't actualy think it was as much of a two stage detonation as you think. From what I remember, there was the detonation which blew out from one of the buildings on the surface, the explosion quickly covered the entire screen in a few frames then we went back to the bridge. Sisko told Dax to punch it and we get an external view of the explosion expanding and consuming the base before it reaches a size that flings a shockwave of vapor and debres everywhere which caught their ship and crippled it.

In other words, we know two things:

1) Sisko had enough time to give a verbal order before the blast hit them.

2) There wasn't enough prompt radiation in the initial pulse to do them any harm, so they were safe until they were hit by the matter shockwave.

In other words, the weapon is feeble. Precisely as surmised. Thanks for proving it, Chris.

[Chris OFarrell]

And I don't actualy think it was as much of a two stage detonation as you think. From what I remember, there was the detonation which blew out from one of the buildings on the surface, the explosion quickly covered the entire screen in a few frames then we went back to the bridge. Sisko told Dax to punch it and we get an external view of the explosion expanding and consuming the base before it reaches a size that flings a shockwave of vapor and debres everywhere which caught their ship and crippled it.

In other words, we know two things:

1) Sisko had enough time to give a verbal order before the blast hit them.

[/i]

Not exactly. The bomb detonates and its very clearly rocks the ship. HARD. Sisko screams at Dax to punch it. The ship wheels around and manages to avoid most of the shockwave but does get caught by some of it. And I'm not sure how big the asteriod was or how far they were orbiting from it.

2) There wasn't enough prompt radiation in the initial pulse to do them any harm, so they were safe until they were hit by the matter shockwave.

? Exactly why would there be a large radiation pulse? Its not like it was a neutron bomb detonation or a M/AM reaction that sends out Gamma. We don't have the first clue how Ultritium works. Nor do we know what kind of armour or shileding a Jem'Hadar ship has on its hull against radiation of various kinds. Physicly the ships are bloody tough, in 'The Ship', one survived more or less intact an uncontroled entry and collision with a planet, getting burried halfway through a cliff with no major structual damage that I could see in the episode or when they showed it after.

[Durandal]

Not exactly. The bomb detonates and its very clearly rocks the ship. HARD. Sisko screams at Dax to punch it. The ship wheels around and manages to avoid most of the shockwave but does get caught by some of it. And I'm not sure how big the asteriod was or how far they were orbiting from it.

That's it? It rocked the ship? So the photon release was minuscule next to the disturbance it caused. This hardly indicates a considerable yield.

Exactly why would there be a large radiation pulse? Its not like it was a neutron bomb detonation or a M/AM reaction that sends out Gamma. We don't have the first clue how Ultritium works. Nor do we know what kind of armour or shileding a Jem'Hadar ship has on its hull against radiation of various kinds. Physicly the ships are bloody tough, in 'The Ship', one survived more or less intact an uncontroled entry and collision with a planet, getting burried halfway through a cliff with no major structual damage that I could see in the episode or when they showed it after.

All explosions release gamma rays. That's what an explosion is, a release of energy. The discrepancy is a matter of intensity and momentum in the photons released.

This isn't directed at you exclusively, but I'm getting sick of this Trekkie nonsense about, "Well maybe it's an element we don't know about, so it could carry more energy in its bonds than its rest energy," or "Maybe it's an explosion we don't know about, so it doesn't act like any other explosions." Please endeavor to educate yourselves on these matters before commenting on them.

[The Silence and I]

Durandal wrote:

That's it? It rocked the ship? So the photon release was minuscule next to the disturbance it caused. This hardly indicates a considerable yield.

Photons don't carry an awful lot of momentum, if they rocked the ship at all it should be impressive. Especially as the energy release must have been in all directions, not focused on Sisko's ship.

[Durandal]

If you have a carrier in decent proximity to a nuclear blast, it'll get knocked around, as well. Knocking a ship around isn't really that impressive. We can do it today.

[The Silence and I]

Ah, but that includes the effects of atmospheric (matter) shockwaves. I haven't seen the episode, but if the ship was rocked by photons only (before the second, matter shock), then an idea of the energy needed to do this can be formed. Assuming no mass lightening, and a mass of 10,000 tons for the Jem 'Bug,' and an acceleration of 0.25 m/sec2 caused by the initial impact should require 2.5E6 N. Again, assuming radiation only, it would require ~7.6E+14 watts of radiation. Note, this assumes all radiation is absorbed, not reflected. This is about 181 KT over an unknown surface area. That is higher than I thought. Obviously, mass lightening will lower the figure, but I have no idea how much, so I didn't try.

Edit: If my calculations are haywire, sorry!!

[Durandal]

The ship was obviously not rocked by photons. It was rocked by the matter shockwave. The photons do radiative damage. Unless your blast is unimaginably powerful, a bunch of photons won't really move you that much.

The point is that the thermal release was not significant.

[The Silence and I]

If the ship was rocked by the matter shockwave, then fine, those calcs go out the window. I only tried that because I was under the impression the ship was rocked before the matter shock wave hit:

Chris O'Farrell wrote:

Not exactly. The bomb detonates and its very clearly rocks the ship. HARD. Sisko screams at Dax to punch it. The ship wheels around and manages to avoid most of the shockwave but does get caught by some of it. And I'm not sure how big the asteriod was or how far they were orbiting from it.

Based on this it seemed like the explosive went off, the ship was rocked, fairly hard, then turned and ran away from the rapidly approaching debris field/shockwave. Again, I'm basing this off of other posts, made by people who have seen the explosion as I have not.

[Durandal]

What he's neglecting is that a multi-gigaton explosion's shockwave would have torn the ship apart, if not thrown it quite a distance.

[Alyeska]

What he's neglecting is that a multi-gigaton explosion's shockwave would have torn the ship apart, if not thrown it quite a distance.

For the purpose of this particular incident you do NOT look at other firepower figures.

[Darth Wong]

The ship was obviously not rocked by photons. It was rocked by the matter shockwave. The photons do radiative damage. Unless your blast is unimaginably powerful, a bunch of photons won't really move you that much.

Actually, they will through a secondary mechanism. Radiative heating of an object can boil off surface material on the facing side, which causes a rocketry effect.

As for the point raised by Chris, we would expect a huge radiation pulse because the protons, neutrons, and gamma rays released by the initial blast will escape the small structure. In atmosphere, they are stopped by successive layers of atmosphere, but in space, once they get past their immediate surroundings they're free. So unless the explosion is a simple chemical explosion (in which case you'd better prepare to be laughed at for trying to make a big deal out of a chemical explosive), you will get radiation, and lots of it.