Your assumptions are incorrect.
Commercial starship lifeboat requirements
- Thread starter HG_B
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Your assumptions are incorrect.
Hi,
since it is currently believed that life (in some forms such as viruses etc) may be able to survive not inly travel through space but also atmospheric entry as part of a meteorite, its not really clear to me that TL 7 heat & radiation efforts can necessarily be expected to eradicate such things.
Hi,
Not really. Its just that since a space ship really just seems to be 'lone oasis' in a massive sea of near nothingness that will kill you in a matter of just a few moments and where any potential 'safe haven' in such an environment may be few and far between it gets me thinking about 'back ups' and 'safety measures'.
As I've already noted for some ships in some operations it may well be that options other than providing a lifeboat/lifepod or other similar craft may make most sense. But for all vessels and situation I think it makes a lot of sense to investigate potential situations that you may find yourself in and what the best possible solution for your ship based on looking at everything that seems pertinent.
Added to that then is also whether it might make sense to modify either deckplans and/or the ship design sequence and specs to reflect the approach selected by the designer for that particular ship.
For me, personally, I can see a lot of potential benefits for lifeboats and lifepods in some situations, but as I've already noted I think that lifeboats (in terms of existing small craft) really already exist in pretty much every version of Traveller that I'm familiar with so to me some of the previous discussions are really more along the lines of a) if they exist how can they be used, b) if some ships either can't or don't carry small craft are their other options that might be possible in the place of them, and c) for some ships (particularly those that carry a lot of people) would something in addition to existing small craft also make sense.
CosmicGamer
SOC-14 1K
Again, I don't see this as the options vs a life boat, in many cases it's just the way I see a ship is whether it has a life boat or not. Backups are essential and can be provided in many ways or multiple different backups on the same ship. Here is my post for one situation.
The habitat module is Cr 20,000 vs a Cr. 14,000,000 life boat (both from Mongoose core rules).
Hi,
I have no problems with back-ups as a potential solution in some cases. However, although a lot of talk is made of back-ups, other than specific systems which many rulesets provide options on (such as the ability to fit larger than necessary power plants, jump drives and maneuver drives, or back-up bridge & basic controls, computers and some defensive systems) I haven't seen a lot to suggest how 'redundant' basic ship systems are and a lot of the deckplans that I have seen do not really seem to suggest much in the way of being configured to allow back-up ways of doing things (ie they may only show a single airlock, one pathway from the bridge to the engine room etc).
If it is intended that stuff like life-support (such as air handling and water supply and treatment etc) as well as grav platting, heating and cooling and such are supposed to be redundantly configured it would be interesting to see more info on this, including how it might affect game play etc.
Hi,
In looking through the internet on the subject of controlling the spread of diseases and such you can find many references to the role that isolating those infected, as well as quarantining those that might be infected etc.
On a small space ship (say a scout/courier or a free trader for example) most any deckplan that I have seen (if I am recalling correctly) doesn't really seem to show any form of sickbay and the layout of the staterooms don't really seem to indicate any way for isolating one stateroom from the rest.
As such, if a passenger becomes ill with an infectious disease its hard to see how that person can be physically separated from the rest (especially since the interior partition bulkheads and sliding doors apparently are not considered air tight and its hard to see how water and air supply for any one stateroom can be segregated from the rest).
As such, especially for diseases that may be similar to Legionaries disease (which apparently can be spread by stuff that can infest modern day air conditioning systems) or other diseases that apparently can get into a water supply since it may be hard to isolate those infected personnel from the non-infected (or at least those not showing any signs of disease) one specific means of trying to isolate the not yet sick from the sick (and any contamination that may be able to get into the ship's life support systems) would seem to potentially be to move the non-sick (or at least those not yet showing signs of sickness) into somewhere with a completely separate life support system, such as a lifeboat/lifepod and/or small craft.
For a livestock carrier where an outbreak has also occurred, a similar approach may also be used.
Isolation of the protection against biological warfare kind is hardly practical, but then, natural diseases aren't usually that infectious.
EDIT: Missed the fallacy the first time around. It's one you've made before: We're discussing how to change starship designs to solve the problem of isolating infectious patients. As such, what most any deckplan shows is irrelevant. What's germane is what changes can be made to most any deckplan that will solve the problem; bung in a lifeboat or something less drastic?
Suggestion for something less drastic: Fixing up a backup life support system that can be switched on and set to service a separate set of staterooms would be far cheaper than a lifeboat. Especially if some staterooms have been made airtight.
Mind you, if we do look at canonical deckplans, it could be argued that the lack of sickbays and isolation wards shows that, for whatever reason[*], people in the Traveller universe are not worried enough about infectious diseases aboard ships to invest in sickbays, let alone isolation facilities (Or lifeboats, for that matter).
[*] My take is that ultra-tech medical scanners are capable of giving anyone a clean bill of health in a very short time and that the ship's medic give everyone a routine scan before they're allowed aboard. It's so routine that it hasn't been worth mentioning before. 
TL 12 air tent and boiling all water from the recycler. That will handle anything but the very most contrieved disease.
Hans
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Patron Zero
SOC-13
Just a silly thought but here goes.
On smaller starships like Scout/Couriers or others with a general layout of a single deck for quarters (yes, I know about the upper-lower compartments), why not have the entire cabin so configured as a lifeboat or just a self-contained rescue space ?
That concept sort of goes back to the idea of a 'hardened' standard cargo container for such application but on most starships the single occupancy staterooms are of that size-displacement.
Mind there would be some dockyard time involved for retro-fitting an existing ship or addition costs if the vessel is under construction but depending on how ship's are 'licensed' in one's particular TU, such might be a code requirement.
On smaller starships like Scout/Couriers or others with a general layout of a single deck for quarters (yes, I know about the upper-lower compartments), why not have the entire cabin so configured as a lifeboat or just a self-contained rescue space ?
That concept sort of goes back to the idea of a 'hardened' standard cargo container for such application but on most starships the single occupancy staterooms are of that size-displacement.
Mind there would be some dockyard time involved for retro-fitting an existing ship or addition costs if the vessel is under construction but depending on how ship's are 'licensed' in one's particular TU, such might be a code requirement.
Per the official deckplans (Sup 7), essentially, the type S has 13-14 Vacuum-tight compartments already.
Main deck:
1. Avionics
2. Bridge
3. Habitation (quarters and commons)
4. Mission pallet bay and aft hallway
5. Engineering
6. Air/raft bay
7. & 8. Landing Gear
Upper Deck †
9. Forward
10. Midships
11. Aft/Turret
Lower Deck
12: "forward cargo bay" †
other:
13. 14. Fuel (P/S?)
All the main deck ones NEED life support except avionics, and for various reasons, each is likely to have its own LS gear.
The Upper deck will have at LEAST one (for the turret), which might have the ability to swap forward to the midship upper deck bay. (four vacuum-seal capable vents - two intakes and two outputs.)
It's hardly unreasonable to shove the contaminated guy into the upper bay, with food and a porta-potty.
† it can't physically fit, due to the slopes, even assuming 2m decks. Ah, the joys of having 3d CAD freeware (sketchup)...
There is a certain - inelegance - in repeating the same basic argument over and over long after multiple others have poked holes in it. Your arguments rest on assumptions of incompetence on the part of ship designers: that the separate sections denoted by bulkheads may not in fact be separate, that the air and water recycling systems within any given section is incapable of preventing the spread of biological contaminants, and so forth. As such, they are IMTU arguments, which is to say that you may apply them to your personal vision of the Traveller universe if you feel it supports the game story you want to tell, but there's no basis in canon for taking them as core assumptions of the canon universe.
Your example of Legionnaires, for example, invokes a variety of bacteria - an organism that in this case is capable of thriving and multiplying in the moist environment of an air conditioning system. It therefore represents not so much a case of an airborne biological transmitting from person to person across rooms, but a contamination of the air system itself that takes advantage of the peculiar properties of an AC. Your argument therefore calls on us to accept that a far future space-faring civilization with several millenia experience in space is not familiar with biological contamination of air recycling systems and is not competent to recognize and deal with it when it arises.
Traveller is science fiction. As such, the fictional story it plays out is to some extent based in science. Science tells us that an organic contaminant, unlike a gas molecule, has to have a certain mass and size in order to be able to be an organic contaminant. Even a virus has a certain minimum size and mass in order to be complex enough to function as a virus. That means that organic contaminants are invariably subject to filtration and to heat sterilization, requiring only that sufficient temperatures be achieved - and if there is anything a starship has in plenty, it is heat for sterilization. A culture with millenia of experience in space must have some familiarity with disease transmission in enclosed environments, especially after the bitter experience of the Vilani at the hands of those filthy disease-ridden Terrans. Thus, to speculate on an organism capable of airborne infection across even the minimal barrier of the room partitions, one must speculate on an airborne infectious agent capable of being picked up by - and surviving a trip through - an air recycling system designed by a culture familiar with the potential for airborne infection through the air recycling system. In other words, one must again assume the designer is incompetent.
However, the strongest counter to your argument remains very basic, and one that has been repeated by several posters: one simply does not put a lifeboat on a ship for the purpose of combating contagion on that ship, not when one has absolutely no means of assuring oneself that the occupants aren't simply concentrating themselves in a small volume to more easily infect each other and to carry that contagion to other worlds. The idea is one that would give the average epidemiologist screaming nightmares.
One small observation on 'life support' from real world air handling system design.
Air systems (water and sewer as well) can be designed as lots of small isolated systems or one larger central system. They often have a minimum practical size.
Setting aside efficiency (which may not matter when fusion makes power virtually limitless and free for life-support purposes), large units are less expensive and more size efficient than an equivalent capacity of smaller units. this is probably fundamental to the mechanical processes involved and not something that will change with some more advanced technology.
So it is possible (and probably trivially simple) to provide each habitable space with a stand-alone life-support system ... I suggest a minimum 'typical' unit able to support two people and 4 dTons with larger spaces having multiple units. In this case simply closing and locking your cabin door provides the isolation sought in several posts and abandoning a room with a malfunctioning unit provides the redundancy/backup capacity sought in several other posts.
The decision to be made: Is many small LS units the norm?
If YES, then there is an opportunity to reduce weekly LS costs by shutting off unused units. There is also an opportunity to reduce initial construction costs by installing more efficient central units (which may not allow a reduction in weekly LS costs).
If NO, then designing a ship for many small LS units should increase initial construction costs (but offer the potential to reduce weekly operational costs).
In either case, many small units will be more expensive to maintain than one large unit ... but higher or lower initial costs will account for that through the annual maintenance costs.
So just some thoughts from Architecture for the grist mill.
Air systems (water and sewer as well) can be designed as lots of small isolated systems or one larger central system. They often have a minimum practical size.
Setting aside efficiency (which may not matter when fusion makes power virtually limitless and free for life-support purposes), large units are less expensive and more size efficient than an equivalent capacity of smaller units. this is probably fundamental to the mechanical processes involved and not something that will change with some more advanced technology.
So it is possible (and probably trivially simple) to provide each habitable space with a stand-alone life-support system ... I suggest a minimum 'typical' unit able to support two people and 4 dTons with larger spaces having multiple units. In this case simply closing and locking your cabin door provides the isolation sought in several posts and abandoning a room with a malfunctioning unit provides the redundancy/backup capacity sought in several other posts.
The decision to be made: Is many small LS units the norm?
If YES, then there is an opportunity to reduce weekly LS costs by shutting off unused units. There is also an opportunity to reduce initial construction costs by installing more efficient central units (which may not allow a reduction in weekly LS costs).
If NO, then designing a ship for many small LS units should increase initial construction costs (but offer the potential to reduce weekly operational costs).
In either case, many small units will be more expensive to maintain than one large unit ... but higher or lower initial costs will account for that through the annual maintenance costs.
So just some thoughts from Architecture for the grist mill.
I don't know if this was mentioned upthread or not, but one possible method for isolating some who is ill, might be the use of a survival bubble. It is a 2 meter diameter bubble capable of providing life support in a vacuum with a 2 hour tank for air. Presumably - such bubbles would have the ability to change tanks externally. Equally presumable, would be the option for such bubbles to be manufactured to specifications - permitting one to be built as an isolation device allowing a doctor or what have you (think external rescuer) to manipulate the survivor within the bubble to render first aid, or medical attention if required. As has been mentioned elsewhere, there is nothing to keep someone from administering a drug to slow down the metabolism of a sick person, which in theory, may be capable of slowing down the progression of any disease that may affect the passengers aboard a ship.
Isolation of the protection against biological warfare kind is hardly practical, but then, natural diseases aren't usually that infectious.
EDIT: Missed the fallacy the first time around. It's one you've made before: We're discussing how to change starship designs to solve the problem of isolating infectious patients. As such, what most any deckplan shows is irrelevant. What's germane is what changes can be made to most any deckplan that will solve the problem; bung in a lifeboat or something less drastic?
Suggestion for something less drastic: Fixing up a backup life support system that can be switched on and set to service a separate set of staterooms would be far cheaper than a lifeboat. Especially if some staterooms have been made airtight.
Mind you, if we do look at canonical deckplans, it could be argued that the lack of sickbays and isolation wards shows that, for whatever reason[*], people in the Traveller universe are not worried enough about infectious diseases aboard ships to invest in sickbays, let alone isolation facilities (Or lifeboats, for that matter).
[*] My take is that ultra-tech medical scanners are capable of giving anyone a clean bill of health in a very short time and that the ship's medic give everyone a routine scan before they're allowed aboard. It's so routine that it hasn't been worth mentioning before.
TL 12 air tent and boiling all water from the recycler. That will handle anything but the very most contrieved disease.
Hans
Hi,
The intent of mentioning canon deckplans was to specifically show that changes to them would be required as I have noted previously.
As for diseases being contrived or not, boiling water, air tents and the like are not really capable of controlling some known existing diseases right now, so its unlcear how boiling water (for instance) at TL12 will change anything.
As for air tents, evenif you assumed that they could be perfectly impervious to the leakage of any bacteria or virus (which I believe would be quite a challenge) you would still have an issue with anything entering or leaving the tent needing to be somehow treated as well, with any/all seals around the openings needing to be resistant to allowing anything through as well as being of a material that will not allow anything to adhere to them or become affixed to any irregularities in its surface (or that is most rubber type compounds and/or anything else with any form of pores big enough to entrap bacteria or a virus would likely be unsuitable) etc.
Things like zippers, velcro, rubber compounds, magnetic seals and the like may likely not be well suited to any such task, and any form of compound used to lubricate the mechanisms of the door could also be an issue, for example.
So even if some new form of material can be developed by TL12 (bearing in mind that not everything in the Traveller universe is at TL 12, especially across the several different millieu) then it may well be likely this still would not necesarily be proof against even currently known diesaeses (not even considereing any potential for accidents happening, etc).
PS. I don't think I mentioned diseases as being from biological warfare anywhere and some existing non-biological warfare diseases can be quite infectious, especially when you consider that on a starship you will have all the people rebreathing the same air, redrinking or using the same water, and living and working in the same limited confines for over a one week period.
Hi,
I haven't really seen much in the way of any argument yet that has poked holes in any of my concerns, myself. There is ample information on the internet relating to several dangerous diseases that currently exist. The are references in Canon not only small craft being used as lifeboats, but also in one of the first published adventures that such a small craft may have been used as a lifeboat t escape an outbreak of a disease onboard a ship. Similarly Canon has also provided refernces to diseases having been a very big concern in at least one major setting that rules have been published for.
And, many arguments against the fitting of lifeboats and/or lifpods etc have seemed to focus in on 'typical merchant ships in typical operations', whereas many vessels in space in a Traveller type setting may well not be 'typical merchant ships' nor be operating 'in typical merchant settings'. Specifically, many references have been already made to other insystem traffic which appears would not necessarily conform to some/many of the assumption that various posters have put forth based on 'typical merchant ships' and 'typical merchant operations'.
As for the assumption of incompetence on the part of ship designers, I don't agree with that assessment either. In looking at canon deck plans it really seems to me that no effort has been put into making separate staterooms 'isolatable' from others due to the use of non-airtight partitions and simple non-airtight sliding doors. that to me seems to be a design decision and has nothing to do with competence or incompetence.
As for redundancy of systems there does not appear to be much anything that I've been able to find in canon to suggest that it exists, unless it is something specifically incorporated as part of the design (such as over sized drives and/or powerplant, or back-up bridges, computers and the like).
And taking anyone of a number of real world items as an example you can see that it is not really common that all systems will be multiply redundant. For instance on a car you may have a spare tire or even one of those batteries with 'spare" capacity that can be accessed by fliiping a swith to give you one last attempt (ot two) at trying to start the car in the event that main battery has died, but you don't typically have a secondary fuel system, electrical wiring, air conditioner, radiator and cooling loop etc.
Similarly for an ocean going ship. While you may have backups for your electrical generation and propulsion plant, backup for things like potable water piping and/or air conditioning and ventilation ducting do not typcially exist. There may be valves and dampers that may allow you to cut off sections and/or reroute around small issues, and the air conditioner units and water 'evaporators' (or equivalent) may be such that you can pull one 'unit' offline but there do not appear to be any large scale backups to the distribution systems.
In addition, as I've already noted during the mention of the DC-10 aircraft, even for more critical systems, while 3 separate loops were provided on that type plane for its hydraulic system, in at least two cases engine failure was able to 'take-down' all three systems at once.
As such, I don't think that noting that some basic systems may be subject to failure and/or that the design of a craft does not seem to support providing a completely separate system to various parts of the ship, or a parallel backup system for those systems suggests anything along the lines of saying that the 'designers are/were incompetent'. Rather I believe I'm really just noting that the designs do not appear to be all that well suited to certain contingencies (based on the info provided).
As I have noted previously, canon appears to stretch from 1st contact to the post Computer Virus era and as such does not necessarily represent just the far, far future. In addition there are references in canon to how the Vilani (and others in the 1st Imperium) were unprepared for the outbreak of many diseases which occurred after contact with the Vilani and throughout parts of the Interstaller Wars era. As such, to me it appears that there is specific reference in canon on issues pertaining to the the spreading of diseases and the Vilani's ability to deal with them.
Even today HEPA filters are not fully effective means of treating air and in some situations even when provisions are made to allow them to be fitted it appears that they are not always installed operationally. Beyond this when you look at many modern warships you may notice that many areas of such ships are not necessarily given full protection against radioligical, biological and chemical threats, even though such ships are/were designed specifically to be able to operate during periods where radiological, biological and chemical agents may be deployed, in part because of the difficulty in providing such systems for the entire ship. As such, in the description of many ships you will sometimes see reference to a protected 'citadel' instead.
(see for instance this document exchange.dnv.com/publishing/ruleshslc/2011-01/hs610.pdf )
I never suggested that the purpose of a lifebost/lifepod is solely for combating contagion but rather I have just tried to show how a lifeboat/lifepod could be useful in such a situation. As I also have noted from what I have read a very basic first step in trying to treat and limit the spread of a contagion is 'isolation' and 'quarantine'. Since the deckplans of the vessels that I have seen do not seem to be all that well suited to try and 'isolate' ill personnel (without major changes to the deckplans etc) than one option would be to instead try and 'isolate' or 'quarantine' those that appear to be non-infected onboard lifeboats or lifepods or other small craft which may already be on the craft (each of which would have its own indiependent life support systems).
The contrievance includes getting someone infected by one of these rare diseases. And if boiling the water isn't enough, run it through a filter.
Technobabble handwave: Molecular bonding techniques.
And if a ship is unlucky enough to run into one of those rare high-penetration diseases, it would be out of luck. The question is, how many shipowners would worry about something like that happening enough to pay to guard against it? And if he does pay to guard against it, is he going to pay a couple of hundred thousand credits to include a real isolation ward or is he going to pay 15 million credits to include a lifeboat?
No, I mentioned biological warfare agents as an example of a threat I didn't think standard precautions would work against. If you want to include the odd equally dangerous disease, go right ahead. Could you provide a few examples of such diseases? I'd like to know just how common they are and just how dangerous they are.
I guess by now you will have read AT's post about how easy it is to include separate life support systems for separate parts of a ship. Such a separate life support system would most likely be part of any isolation ward setup.
Hans
Looking at the discussions a different way, it has been suggested by some that lifeboats/lifepods would not be required onboard typical(?) ships because there are other means of dealing with issues.
One such suggestion was that in the event of an incident onboard a ship in normal space a rescue craft could be launched to render assistance. It might be of value to explore such a concept in more detail here.
Specifically, for example questions arise as to;
a) whether such rescue craft are operated in all star systems
b) who are they operated by (the Imperium or local governements etc)
c) and, what capabilities would they have
If I am recalling correctly, I think that a system's starport code is based on the capabilities of the services that can be provided, with come of the lower codes representing a fairly primitive setup. I could easily see that perhaps in a system with a type A or B starport (at least based on the CT definitions) as being capable of supporting a coordinated rscue service, but I'm not really so sure about systems with type C and lower facilities.
Along these lines, the question comes up as to whether such operations would be run by the government of the Imperium, the Local Sector Government, the local system Government, or a Non-Government Organization (like the Traveller's Aide Society)? And if run by the Government of the Imperium, what would happen in non-Imperium space?
Also, if run by the Imperium, are identical craft provided in all systems, or if run by more local Governments is there a possibility that the rescue craft in question may be limited by local Tech Levels and such?
All these would be interesting to further explore if it is contended that in system rescue services could be relied upon to alleviate the need for any specific systems onboard starships, though this may well be a topic better suited for a separate thread.
One such suggestion was that in the event of an incident onboard a ship in normal space a rescue craft could be launched to render assistance. It might be of value to explore such a concept in more detail here.
Specifically, for example questions arise as to;
a) whether such rescue craft are operated in all star systems
b) who are they operated by (the Imperium or local governements etc)
c) and, what capabilities would they have
If I am recalling correctly, I think that a system's starport code is based on the capabilities of the services that can be provided, with come of the lower codes representing a fairly primitive setup. I could easily see that perhaps in a system with a type A or B starport (at least based on the CT definitions) as being capable of supporting a coordinated rscue service, but I'm not really so sure about systems with type C and lower facilities.
Along these lines, the question comes up as to whether such operations would be run by the government of the Imperium, the Local Sector Government, the local system Government, or a Non-Government Organization (like the Traveller's Aide Society)? And if run by the Government of the Imperium, what would happen in non-Imperium space?
Also, if run by the Imperium, are identical craft provided in all systems, or if run by more local Governments is there a possibility that the rescue craft in question may be limited by local Tech Levels and such?
All these would be interesting to further explore if it is contended that in system rescue services could be relied upon to alleviate the need for any specific systems onboard starships, though this may well be a topic better suited for a separate thread.
Hi,
Because diseases tranported from society to society by interstellar contact is already part of Canon, I'm not convinced that they should be so easily dismissed. When the Terrans and Vilani made first contact the Vilani were already at a Tech Level that allowed Jump-1 (or was it Jump-2?) capability but they were still susceptible to diseases, so I'm not fully convinced that having advanced technology is the sole solution to dealing with diseases. Add to this the fact that its also Canon that people still age and eventually die (with the effects of aging potentially beginng to show up either in the late 30's or early 40s - I don't have my references handy right now) leaves me with the impression that medical technology even in the later milieus may still not be super advanced. Even the fact that anagathics exist but may have unpleasant side effects also kind of suggests to me limits to medical technology in such settings.
I'm not fully sure of what the definition of 'high-penetration' is here, but as for types of diseases, yes we could be talking about something as unpleasant as 'Ebola' for example or we could instead be talking about something like 'SARS', 'MERS' or some variant of the 'bird flue'. I'm not trying to suggest that every medical outbreak will be calamitous or anything like that, but its my enderstanding that even stuff that may be treatable if caught early enough can potentially be a severe threat in the event that a) you don't have the medicine needed to treat the disease onboard (or at least not enough for everyone) b) the strain of what you are dealing with is either something new (or a new strain of something previously known) that is resisting your current effort to treat.
When you take into account that the ship in question will likely be/has been recycling its air and water over a week plus (especially if its unstreamlined and can't land to refresh its air etc) and that you will be working and living in very close proximity to each other over that time it doesn't seem that hard to me to see the potential for illnesses to spread amoung the people onboard unless actions are taken very early (including trying to isolate the sick fromeveryone else in all ways possible)
Since 1976 (according to Wikipedia) there have been at least 28 recorded outbreaks of Ebola including one that was currently ongoing in Uganda when the article was written. That specific outbreak had a 44% fataility rate for those infected with 31 reported deaths. Other outbreaks, such as one in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2007 is said to have resulted in 187 deaths.
Other diseases of potential interest here include the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) which Wikipedia indicates is said to have resulted in 8273 cases in Southern China between Nov 2002 and July 2003 with 775 deaths reported. It is also indicated that it is believed to have spread to 37 different countries.
Another such illness might be the current H1N1 variant of the Avian Flue which is believed to have caused about 17,000 deaths by 2010.
Aditionally the so called "Spanish Flue" was (if I am understanding correctly) also a variant of the H1N1 Avian Flue and is said to have infected 500 million people worl wide from Jan 1918 to Dec 1920 and resulted in the deaths of 50 to 100 million (which Wikipedia indicates was 3-5% of the world's population at that time).
Beyond this are also illnesses like the Plague which has sprung up several times throughout history, and for which there are still reported outbreaks every year or two. In fact I believe that there is currently a case of it reported in New Mexico right now. It is said to have possibly reduced the population of the world from 450 million to 350-375 million during its 14th Century outbreak.
And finally I guess we could also consider stuff like Legionaire's Disease for which Wikipedia notes there are about 8000 to 18000 cases reported anually in the US. Wikipedia goes on to note that during its initial outbreak, when it was not yet well understood, there wer 34 deaths recorded among the 180 cases reported, but that "Mortality has plunged to less than 5% if therapy is started quickly. Delay in giving the appropriate antibiotic leads to higher mortality". It also notes that "The fatality rate of Legionnaires' disease has ranged from 5% to 30% during various outbreaks and approaches 50% for nosocomial infections, especially when treatment with antibiotics is delayed.[10] According to the journal Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology, hospital-acquired Legionella pneumonia has a fatality rate of 28%, and the principal source of infection in such cases is the drinking-water distribution system.[20]"
In addition, with respect to sources where it can incubate it notes;
"Potential sources of contaminated water include cooling towers (some 40% to 60% of ones tested[13]) used in industrial cooling water systems as well as in large central air conditioning systems, evaporative coolers, nebulizers, humidifiers, whirlpool spas, hot water systems, showers, windshield washers,[14] architectural fountains, room-air humidifiers, ice making machines, misting equipment, and similar disseminators that draw upon a public water supply.
The disease may also be transmitted from contaminated aerosols generated in hot tubs if the disinfection and maintenance program is not done rigorously.[15] Freshwater ponds, creeks, and ornamental fountains are potential sources of Legionella.[16] The disease is particularly associated with hotels, fountains, cruise ships and hospitals with complex potable water systems and cooling systems.
Respiratory care devices such as humidifiers and nebulizers used with contaminated tap water may contain Legionella. Using sterile water is very important, especially when using respiratory care devices.[17]
Potting mix and compost is also another potential source, especially breathing airborne bacteria therefrom."
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o:Lest we spend another 10 or 12 pages fruitlessly giving you information that you're going to - umm - "not see", I'm going to suggest you do more research on the subject of infections and infection control. Rather than just learning about all the deadlies out there, maybe do a little research into exactly how they spread, how long they survive outside of a host, how long it takes for an infected host to begin showing symptoms, at what point an infected host becomes infectious, and perhaps most importantly how big or small they are. When you've done that and can find me a bacterium that can get through a nonporous material constructed to prevent the passage of oxygen and nitrogen molecules without leaving the construct leaking said oxygen and nitrogen molecules, we can explore the issue in more detail.
Because you data is incomplete. Some MAY survive under the surface of some particles that reenter where they don't get exposed to very high temps. Extremely high temps (that air can be subjected to at TL 7) WILL kill ALL known bacteria & viruses.
There ya go. Problem SOLVED.
Hi,
Its my understanding that iron core meteorites can have a very high rate of thermal transfer and as such if they get hot on the outside they are also hot on the inside.
In addition to this there are know species of bacteria on Earth that can withstand temperatures up to 113 deg C (235 deg F).
As for trying to attain higher temperatures within the closed confines of a space ship any heat so generated would seem like it would have to be 'dumped' to a heat seat somewhere.
As such, it does not appear to me that anything can really be considered solved at this point.
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