Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I always assumed your blood would start to boil in space, kind of like getting a bad case of the bends. But then again, if people's blood doesn't boil in an airliner decompression scenario, I suppose it might not in space either.

You guys are both right and wrong; vacuum exposure doesn’t immediately kill you, particularly not the cold. You’re very warm and there’s nothing to remove the heat from your body other than radiation and humans are pretty poor radiators, so the movie idea of people freezing solid in seconds or even minutes is nonsense. Unfortunately, you can’t just use an oxygen mask, it just doesn’t work at low pressure, you need at least a partial pressure suit that covers your head and lungs; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armstrong_limit


Automatically Appended Next Post:
As far as I can tell, the scene in The Expanse where Naomi dives out of an airlock unprotected is a pretty accurate representation of the actual reality.

Voss wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
It’s off screen, but he’s definitely a crispy critter!

Very much looking forward to Wednesday’s latest entry. But, with just two more to go including that one? Seems timely to remind folk Ahsoka is expected to be multi-season, and building to a film cross over with Mando and Skellington Crew, so don’t expect anything terribly conclusive!

What the feth is Skellington Crew?

This here thingy:

Star Wars: Skeleton Crew is an upcoming live-action American television series created by Jon Watts and Christopher Ford for the streaming service Disney+. It is part of the Star Wars franchise, taking place in the same time frame as The Mandalorian and its interconnected spin-offs after the events of Return of the Jedi (1983). Skeleton Crew tells a coming-of-age story.

Skeleton Crew is scheduled to be released on Disney+ in 2023,[10] and will consist of eight episodes.[5] White expected the series to be released in November or December 2023.[4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars:_Skeleton_Crew

I figured it was something like this:

Well, that piece has been yoinked to be printed onto a bag or t-shirt! By me. For my use only.

 Grey Templar wrote:


Space decompression could be survived basically the same way as you survive a high altitude airplane one. IE: You get oxygen, somehow. Obviously airplane oxygen masks wouldn't work in space because they aren't vacuum sealed. But you could probably make emergency helmets which can seal around your neck(or potentially even just your nose and mouth) and give you a few precious minutes of oxygen. The rest of your body will be fine in a vacuum.

This is inaccurate. The absence of atmospheric pressure will cause your lungs to rupture, your blood will boil and other fluids near your skin (perspiration) will similarly boil/outgas through your pores, causing ebullism in the process (i.e. swelling, bruising, internal bleeding - can also lead to fatal embolism). Your death would not be instantaneous but it would be pretty painful over a period of several minutes (I would guess around ~5 minutes). Even if you did somehow survive, you would have long-term cardiovascular and neurological damage. That doesn't even begin to account for the impact of direct exposure to starlight and cosmic radiation, etc.

Actually, even with a helmet - breathing would be a bit of an issue. The pressure differential between the helmet and the surrounding environment would mean that the helmet would be trying to pop off (just like a mask would) in order to achieve pressure equalization. Even if you could find a way to prevent that, it probably would be uncomfortable as it will basically be trying to remove itself. On top of that, while you would be able to inhale - you would have issues exhaling, as the pressure is pushing into your lungs and there is no corresponding equalizing pressure outside of your body to assist with pushing the air back out.

When you're breathing you aren't really "sucking" air in and "blowing" air out. Whats happening is that your musculature expands or contracts the volume of your lung cavity. When you inhale, atmospheric pressure pushes air into your lungs to fill the expanded volume. When you breathe out, the compression of the cavity causes the air to be expelled back out. In atmosphere, its not an issue because the pressure differential between your body and the surrounding environment is nonexistent and your exhalation doesn't really impact the pressure of the surrounding environment and so your body does not need to do any significant work to exhale.

This is a different situation however, where your exhalation needs to push against the pressure of the air trying to fill your lungs through the mask, and in so doing you are expelling a volume of air from your lungs that is possibly equal to or greater than the volume of air in the mask, which results in the air pressure from the mask pushing against your lungs increasing as you exhale, probably to a point where your exhalation fails and the pressure backfills into your lungs again. Realistically, you would have to breathe by inhaling from the mask, removing it, and exhaling to vacuum, rather than being able to breathe continuously via the mask. Pressure-demand mask systems used for high-altitude aviation (such as those worn by fighter pilots) works this way and has the same issues, and thats while you still have some atmospheric pressure being applied to your body as cockpits are partially pressurized in order to reduce the pressure differential so that you *dont* have to wear a full pressure suit.

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:


Space decompression could be survived basically the same way as you survive a high altitude airplane one. IE: You get oxygen, somehow. Obviously airplane oxygen masks wouldn't work in space because they aren't vacuum sealed. But you could probably make emergency helmets which can seal around your neck(or potentially even just your nose and mouth) and give you a few precious minutes of oxygen. The rest of your body will be fine in a vacuum.

This is inaccurate. The absence of atmospheric pressure will cause your lungs to rupture, your blood will boil and other fluids near your skin (perspiration) will similarly boil/outgas through your pores, causing ebullism in the process (i.e. swelling, bruising, internal bleeding - can also lead to fatal embolism). Your death would not be instantaneous but it would be pretty painful over a period of several minutes (I would guess around ~5 minutes). Even if you did somehow survive, you would have long-term cardiovascular and neurological damage. That doesn't even begin to account for the impact of direct exposure to starlight and cosmic radiation, etc.

No. Your blood is not going to boil. It's far too thick and your body's own internal pressure will prevent that. Again, you are only going from 0 to 1 atmospheres of pressure. Liquid on the exterior of your body will boil away, but not anything inside it. Your pores are going to leak a little, but nothing that will actually damage you unless you stay out there for extended periods.

Lungs can certainly get damaged in the initial decompression, but that is more of a luck of the draw on what point in a breath cycle were you. It could be severe, but it is nowhere near a guarantee.

Likewise, its not going to cause embolisms inside you for the same reason your blood won't boil inside you. The Bends is not a good comparison because that is caused by many orders of magnitude greater pressure differences. For it to do similar damage, Space would need to be several negative atmospheres of pressure. But its not. Its just 0. Another reason The Bends is a bad comparison is because what actually causes it is divers ingesting more nitrogen and other inert gasses into their bloodstream due to the higher pressure(which doesn't exist in space on a space ship), which means when they do return to normal pressure it boils out of their blood. This wouldn't happen in space as you'd have nothing extra to bubble out.

Direct exposure to cosmic radiation is a non-factor. If you survive getting vented there is no way you were exposed long enough for it to matter.

Actually, even with a helmet - breathing would be a bit of an issue. The pressure differential between the helmet and the surrounding environment would mean that the helmet would be trying to pop off (just like a mask would) in order to achieve pressure equalization. Even if you could find a way to prevent that, it probably would be uncomfortable as it will basically be trying to remove itself. On top of that, while you would be able to inhale - you would have issues exhaling, as the pressure is pushing into your lungs and there is no corresponding equalizing pressure outside of your body to assist with pushing the air back out.

When you're breathing you aren't really "sucking" air in and "blowing" air out. Whats happening is that your musculature expands or contracts the volume of your lung cavity. When you inhale, atmospheric pressure pushes air into your lungs to fill the expanded volume. When you breathe out, the compression of the cavity causes the air to be expelled back out. In atmosphere, its not an issue because the pressure differential between your body and the surrounding environment is nonexistent and your exhalation doesn't really impact the pressure of the surrounding environment and so your body does not need to do any significant work to exhale.

This is a different situation however, where your exhalation needs to push against the pressure of the air trying to fill your lungs through the mask, and in so doing you are expelling a volume of air from your lungs that is possibly equal to or greater than the volume of air in the mask, which results in the air pressure from the mask pushing against your lungs increasing as you exhale, probably to a point where your exhalation fails and the pressure backfills into your lungs again. Realistically, you would have to breathe by inhaling from the mask, removing it, and exhaling to vacuum, rather than being able to breathe continuously via the mask. Pressure-demand mask systems used for high-altitude aviation (such as those worn by fighter pilots) works this way and has the same issues, and thats while you still have some atmospheric pressure being applied to your body as cockpits are partially pressurized in order to reduce the pressure differential so that you *dont* have to wear a full pressure suit.

It would be harder to breathe, but assuming the person isn't a total invalid they could force themselves to breathe even if rest of their body was in vacuum.

What I was suggesting wasn't anything like a permanent breathing apparatus. It was more like an emergency oxygen mask for a hypothetical space ship to have.

If you have a ship in space, presumably the crew are not wearing fully pressurized suits at all times. But you could have them potentially carry a little "in case of emergency" thing they could put over their heads in the event they get vented. Potentially giving them a little extra time.

 Jadenim wrote:
You guys are both right and wrong; vacuum exposure doesn’t immediately kill you, particularly not the cold. You’re very warm and there’s nothing to remove the heat from your body other than radiation and humans are pretty poor radiators, so the movie idea of people freezing solid in seconds or even minutes is nonsense. Unfortunately, you can’t just use an oxygen mask, it just doesn’t work at low pressure, you need at least a partial pressure suit that covers your head and lungs; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armstrong_limit


Automatically Appended Next Post:
As far as I can tell, the scene in The Expanse where Naomi dives out of an airlock unprotected is a pretty accurate representation of the actual reality.

Naomi also injected herself with a substance that increases oxygen uptake (she did breathe deeply several times AFTER injection and before exhaling before venting the lock. ) - the same thing they injected into Monica (the reporter) when they got her out of the container.

Ahsoka part 7

We all agree Senator Objection is a secret Imperialist, right?

The moment I saw the droid I knew where that was going. Indeed good way to do that.

For frick’s sake, find better fighter pilots. They were on that ship’s tail Forever, shooting at it, it not shooting back, and couldn’t down it. They’re either The Worst Shots or that thing has truly OP shields.

Ground chase felt unneeded. Should’ve just had them circle up immediately and walked your OP space wizards out to face the mere bandits right off the bat.

Thrawn continues to impress.

This is a really good example of the threat Thrawn presents. Everyone is so worried about this person or that person specifically and Thrawn is worried about finishing the mission.

I did like Thrawn’s reaction to learning who Ahsoka’s master was though. There’s a reason he wants to get out of there asap.

Indeed. Spesh as his assessment was “well she’s going to be unpredictable” and just…rolls with it.

What a damming indictment of Disney though that so few can imagine Thrawn actually winning in any significant way. Would they be able to have him come back and unite Imperial fractions into a credible threat. On one hand Hollywood can mirror yank concerns (and they are ambivalent about authoritarian regimes currently), on the other they really want to flog stuff to said regimes.

 Grey Templar wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:


Space decompression could be survived basically the same way as you survive a high altitude airplane one. IE: You get oxygen, somehow. Obviously airplane oxygen masks wouldn't work in space because they aren't vacuum sealed. But you could probably make emergency helmets which can seal around your neck(or potentially even just your nose and mouth) and give you a few precious minutes of oxygen. The rest of your body will be fine in a vacuum.

This is inaccurate. The absence of atmospheric pressure will cause your lungs to rupture, your blood will boil and other fluids near your skin (perspiration) will similarly boil/outgas through your pores, causing ebullism in the process (i.e. swelling, bruising, internal bleeding - can also lead to fatal embolism). Your death would not be instantaneous but it would be pretty painful over a period of several minutes (I would guess around ~5 minutes). Even if you did somehow survive, you would have long-term cardiovascular and neurological damage. That doesn't even begin to account for the impact of direct exposure to starlight and cosmic radiation, etc.

No. Your blood is not going to boil. It's far too thick and your body's own internal pressure will prevent that. Again, you are only going from 0 to 1 atmospheres of pressure. Liquid on the exterior of your body will boil away, but not anything inside it. Your pores are going to leak a little, but nothing that will actually damage you unless you stay out there for extended periods.

Lungs can certainly get damaged in the initial decompression, but that is more of a luck of the draw on what point in a breath cycle were you. It could be severe, but it is nowhere near a guarantee.

Likewise, its not going to cause embolisms inside you for the same reason your blood won't boil inside you. The Bends is not a good comparison because that is caused by many orders of magnitude greater pressure differences. For it to do similar damage, Space would need to be several negative atmospheres of pressure. But its not. Its just 0. Another reason The Bends is a bad comparison is because what actually causes it is divers ingesting more nitrogen and other inert gasses into their bloodstream due to the higher pressure(which doesn't exist in space on a space ship), which means when they do return to normal pressure it boils out of their blood. This wouldn't happen in space as you'd have nothing extra to bubble out.

Direct exposure to cosmic radiation is a non-factor. If you survive getting vented there is no way you were exposed long enough for it to matter.

Actually, even with a helmet - breathing would be a bit of an issue. The pressure differential between the helmet and the surrounding environment would mean that the helmet would be trying to pop off (just like a mask would) in order to achieve pressure equalization. Even if you could find a way to prevent that, it probably would be uncomfortable as it will basically be trying to remove itself. On top of that, while you would be able to inhale - you would have issues exhaling, as the pressure is pushing into your lungs and there is no corresponding equalizing pressure outside of your body to assist with pushing the air back out.

When you're breathing you aren't really "sucking" air in and "blowing" air out. Whats happening is that your musculature expands or contracts the volume of your lung cavity. When you inhale, atmospheric pressure pushes air into your lungs to fill the expanded volume. When you breathe out, the compression of the cavity causes the air to be expelled back out. In atmosphere, its not an issue because the pressure differential between your body and the surrounding environment is nonexistent and your exhalation doesn't really impact the pressure of the surrounding environment and so your body does not need to do any significant work to exhale.

This is a different situation however, where your exhalation needs to push against the pressure of the air trying to fill your lungs through the mask, and in so doing you are expelling a volume of air from your lungs that is possibly equal to or greater than the volume of air in the mask, which results in the air pressure from the mask pushing against your lungs increasing as you exhale, probably to a point where your exhalation fails and the pressure backfills into your lungs again. Realistically, you would have to breathe by inhaling from the mask, removing it, and exhaling to vacuum, rather than being able to breathe continuously via the mask. Pressure-demand mask systems used for high-altitude aviation (such as those worn by fighter pilots) works this way and has the same issues, and thats while you still have some atmospheric pressure being applied to your body as cockpits are partially pressurized in order to reduce the pressure differential so that you *dont* have to wear a full pressure suit.

It would be harder to breathe, but assuming the person isn't a total invalid they could force themselves to breathe even if rest of their body was in vacuum.

What I was suggesting wasn't anything like a permanent breathing apparatus. It was more like an emergency oxygen mask for a hypothetical space ship to have.

If you have a ship in space, presumably the crew are not wearing fully pressurized suits at all times. But you could have them potentially carry a little "in case of emergency" thing they could put over their heads in the event they get vented. Potentially giving them a little extra time.

This is scientifically wrong. Your blood is 90% water molecules, water boils at room temperature at high altitudes, as it will in vacuum.

Theres no such thing as your bodies internal pressure. Your body is not a pressure vessel. It does not self-pressurize - otherwise you would quite literally explode when exposed to vacuum. Your body pressure is the environmental pressure. If you're tossed into a vacuum, then your "body pressure" gradually drops to zero and every water molecule in your body starts boiling as the boiling point decreases with the decrease in pressure. The idea that your blood won't is predicated on the idea that your cardiovascular system is a closed system and thus "pressurized" by the pump that is your heart, but one of the known effects of vacuum exposure on the human body is tissue rupture (again ebullism (not embolism - embolism is a side-effect of ebullism in this case) and internal bleeding) resulting from the boil-off of body moisture, as well as air escaping the lungs and your intestines. Your closed circulatory system won't stay closed for long (especially if you try holding your breath, which in reality will likely cause more tissue damage and take you out faster than if you didn't). Nobody said anything about the bends, ebullism is a vaguely similar but altogether different (and very real) phenomenon that does occur when the human body is exposed to low pressures at very high altitudes.

The argument of going from 1 to 0 is less damaging than going from high pressure to 1 because the number of atmospheres of change in pressure is smaller is not a good one. That assumes the pressure effects on the human body can be modeled linearly - they aren't. A submarine designed to withstand several atmospheres of pressure would not make a good spaceship, nor vice versa.

What you seem to have missed wrt cosmic radiation is that when exposed to direct sunlight in space, the temperature of the exposed object very rapidly heats to 248degF. That will cook you (and that will *definitely* make your blood boil) unless you happen to be wearing a full body light color/reflective suit.

Love Ezra's new combat style. In particular, Eman Esfandi nails the same kind of poses he used in Rebels for Force pushes and the like.

Ahsoka forgiving Sabine is a wonderfully quiet little moment. Both actors do a great job with that.

Thrawn, Baylan and Shin all really nail their roles in this. Baylan could probably carry his own show at this point, which makes the loss of Ray Stevenson hit all the harder each episode. Thrawn being primarily concerned with where the pieces are at all times is really well done as his frustration when one piece is out of place.

Anakin's perfect. Totally hits home and getting to see Hayden portray him as more as the whiny, insecure child from the prequels is an absolute treat I was not expecting.

All good stuff. Excited to see how they wrap up the season, but certainly going to be sad when its over.

Thrawn is vulnerable though.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Thrawn is vulnerable though.

On the other side? Absolutely. What I meant is on their side of the galaxy with Ahsoka, Sabine and Ezrah somehow pulling off a last ditch maneuver to stop him and save themselves at the same time, possibly aided by a now redeemed Shin or something along those lines.

Could be a redeemed Shin and Baylan. Though given sadly real world issues, I can’t imagine Baylan is going to survive the next episode 😢

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Thrawn is vulnerable though.

Spoiler:

Thus far? We the audience know there to be but one hyperspace route between Here and There. Which means going from There to Here is going to be the same route.

With it kind of looking like Hera can get the support she needs, Thrawn’s ship being knackered, and Elsbeth’s ring not looking terribly well armed as such scale of ships go? Hera could very well picket the point of departure, ready to absolutely pummel anything coming back down that road upon arrival.

Now of course, having seen only one route and there being only one route is dodgy logic, especially as the Night Sisters, who left the original map, are in the mix. And even if it is true? We’ve no idea how quickly the ring ship can plot and execute a second jump.

Personally? I have to assume someone will have considered this. The ring ship may have a second, much smaller hyperdrive for that second jump. Because as hyperspace tracking doesn’t show up for a couple of decades yet, you really don’t need to jump terribly far. Just far enough.

Potentially into inter-system space, if you’ve thought and planned far enough ahead, and left some sort of marker buoy to assist with your next jump to wherever it is you need to get to.

But even so? Assuming a stop off, however brief, at the original point of departure? The New Republic has some chance to take Thrawn out upon arrival.

Thing there?



It’s going to be an interesting finale, that’s for sure.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Right, second watch through now I’ve downed tools for the day.

 AduroT wrote:
We all agree Senator Objection is a secret Imperialist, right?

Very obviously. I only question the term "secret" here.

Also, a bit surprised he's not found chopped to bits in the morning.

He could just be a melt, to be honest.

 LunarSol wrote:

 AduroT wrote:
We all agree Senator Objection is a secret Imperialist, right?

Very obviously. I only question the term "secret" here.

Also, a bit surprised he's not found chopped to bits in the morning.

Fun thought but what if he isn't actually obviously Imperial but his mandate and money come from assuring his constituents that unquestioning commitment to the New Republic is the way forward because THERE. IS. NO. IMPERIAL. THREAT!

Whether that's people who are just tired of conflict, afraid that the Empire might still be able to punish collaboration, or corporations that don't want to get too cozy with the new regime to maintain plausible deniability if the old one comes back, a clever senator could get a lot of votes and donations if he played his cards right and took a definitive, even hardliner position to assure everyone that the upheaval of the past stays in the past and now everything is shiny and chrome.

In other words, he might just be the usual kind of opportunist politician who has to appear convincing in public, regardless of what's actually going on.

It could also be a bloke in a new position of power, not wanting his thunder to be taken by military veterans who absolutely can and will Get Things Done.

In a sense, he’s pretty much an essential naysayer. The dissenting voice wanting to embrace peace, or at least ensure outright war/concerted combat is withheld for the last effort.

This is a Galaxy kind of tired of war and oppression. Many worlds, particular former Separatist Worlds finally have what they wanted. To potentially needlessly plunge it onto a war footing? You risk being seen as scaremongering your way to be a militarised government again.

Of course, those are all pretences to legitimacy for an Imperial Stooge as well.

I'd largely agree, but trying to court martial a general for following up on the theft of a Star Destroyer class hyperdrive goes a little beyond simply being a naysayer. He in no way acts like a man who believes there's nothing out there for Hera to find.

That’s a fair point, and to be honest, not an aspect I’d considered!

in some other, hypothetical sci-fi work, i'd agree theirs a chance he is Misguided, but Wrong.

In Star Wars? Hes either has a petty personal vendetta against Hera for some as yet unseen reason, or hes just a straight imperial collaborator. This aint that deep.

also, how are space whales, which seem to be a well understood natural phenomenon and witnessed by literally dozens of officers of the new republic fleet, being dismissed as "fanciful"?

also, we have confirmation that these events *are* happening after mando S3, given the events on mandalore are mentioned in passing.

The_Real_Chris wrote:
What a damming indictment of Disney though that so few can imagine Thrawn actually winning in any significant way. Would they be able to have him come back and unite Imperial fractions into a credible threat. On one hand Hollywood can mirror yank concerns (and they are ambivalent about authoritarian regimes currently), on the other they really want to flog stuff to said regimes.

How is it an indictment of Disney that the series exists in a larger story? Knowing that Thrawn has to lose has nothing to do with any weaknesses of their writers or whatever you're trying to say about real-world political stuff, it's simply the fact that Ahsoka exists in a known timeline where only a short time remains before the sequel trilogy begins. There isn't enough time for Thrawn to win on any significant scale, he has to be quickly defeated so the Republic can stay in its state of peaceful ignorance and the First Order can begin to do its thing. It's like watching a WWII movie and complaining that the Germans are clearly being set up for defeat and nobody believes they will win.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Geifer wrote:
Fun thought but what if he isn't actually obviously Imperial but his mandate and money come from assuring his constituents that unquestioning commitment to the New Republic is the way forward because THERE. IS. NO. IMPERIAL. THREAT!

Whether that's people who are just tired of conflict, afraid that the Empire might still be able to punish collaboration, or corporations that don't want to get too cozy with the new regime to maintain plausible deniability if the old one comes back, a clever senator could get a lot of votes and donations if he played his cards right and took a definitive, even hardliner position to assure everyone that the upheaval of the past stays in the past and now everything is shiny and chrome.

In other words, he might just be the usual kind of opportunist politician who has to appear convincing in public, regardless of what's actually going on.

I hope that's what it is, and not sheer incompetence by the Republic's intelligence agencies in letting an Imperial agent reach the highest levels of government. And we know it's a thing that the Republic has a significant element that desperately wants to declare that war is over, move on with other concerns, and bury their heads in the sand if there's any suggestion that other threats remain. Wilful ignorance and stupidity, not treason.