@ewingdav Not that I'm defending this show's ridiculousness, but for the sake of conversation, wasn't the ship hit by some sort of collision in the first ep? That could have changed said velocity, I suppose. Also, depending on how how far the destination was, it could be possible that the Ark hadn't yet hit its full velocity in order to reach said destination within the predetermined timeframe. And that precludes the fact that they were woken up early, changing the timeframe altogether if the passengers hope to survive until they reach their destination. I'm not an expert or particularly great at physics from years ago either, but your question got me thinking is all.
@ewingdav they need to increase their velocity to get back to the velocity they were originally at before getting hit. But yeah, once they hit their needed velocity, they shouldn't need to run the engines for thrust until they reach the point they need to decelerate. I think the conventional concept is continuous thrust until the mid point, then flip and continuous thrust in reverse to enter orbit in the destination system.
@ewingdav The bigger issue in this episode is "space turbulence" - whilst trying to tether the Scottish pilot says "I'm fine just a bit of space turbulence" - No atmosphere = no air = no wind = no turbulence....
Shout by OldFartVIP BlockedParent2023-02-19T05:33:47Z
I realize my high school and college physics were a LONG time ago, but does a spaceship NEED to have the engines running ALL the time? I thought the laws of physics and zero gravity stated that once the ship is moving at a fixed velocity, unless something external acts on it (something hits it, they enter the gravity field of some mass, etc) the ship will continue moving in a straight line at the same velocity. Am I wrong?