Cargo or means?
Recent ideas for a plasma drive and to Mars in 39 days, says, expensive and
only special cargos at first.
Asteroid mining and getting people there to mine and what equipment can't be
made there or from things there.. You need a mineral but its not in the
asteroids, or you can't build a plant to make something you need later, then
you have to ship it.
Once you start mining, its collect, process/refine as you can, and package
and ship back the slow way, unless you have a packet got rogue or like, its
no real danger.
Ships to get to orbit, so far not heard anyone talking a Beanstalk
elevators, or its a shuttle of some sort, Virgin Air?
International Space station for now as a collection point for further
missions or what? As well as possible tourism?
But yes, space frieghters likely to be large and compartmentalized for the
most part, but there is always a market for limited runs or products or
smuggling or like.
Alaska State Ferry, used to take tourists, but also locals trying to go
home, epecially at a lower price than having to ship things by barge or
air.. Also some liked to go something like 3rd class, you stayed in the back
and had no state room..
Also not every one can or needs a large frieghter to come by, such as
outposts/mines that are out in the asteroids but not at the main
base/platform or like.. Major corps will likely have some sort of processor
like they do with whale, tuna, salmon and like.. But who will do the small
boats that fish and then send it to the processor? As well as some one will
liekly have a family or small operation or an operation financed by a
smaller country or like?
Mike
----- Original Message -----
From: "Travis Watkins" <[email protected]>
To: "The GURPSnet mailing list" <[email protected]>
Sent: Wednesday, January 09, 2013 9:22 AM
Subject: Re: [gurps] Re: Space Freighter Memes
Why would space freighters be significantly different from modern long
distance trucking and shipping?
Large/bulk/time insensitive cargo
The longest haul transports would be the biggest, and have the lowest crew
per ton(huge cargo ships over water)
From those hubs you transport using smaller, and thus more expensive
transports to smaller destinations until you get ships that make several
deliveries/pickups on a set route from a local hub(long trains over land
to
depots, large trucks from train depots to stores and other large
destinations/depots, smaller trucks on routes to smaller
destinations[USPS/UPS/Fed-Ex delivery trucks]).
Every step of the way uses the cheapest method for getting the cargo to an
area that approximates the destination, and that generally means huge
transports with small crews(people cost money for *every* trip, so you
off-load as much as you can to things like common repair/maintenance
facilities)
And once automatic driving becomes available, Trucking will no-doubt be
the
first and biggest customer as much as the law allows it(at $0.40/mile and
50mph average, that is still a $20+/hr job where you average
12+hours/day[I
think my state regulates 8 hours on/8 hours off for truckers], so a $5k
self-driving rig modification pays for itself in 12,500 miles, or about 20
days(10 days if you use tandem drivers to keep your truck on the road 24
hours a day))
So: what does a freighter look like if it is either fully automated or has
a minimum-wage security guard that just watches the radar and hits the
panic button when the ship is damaged or under attack?
Time sensitive cargo(costs a premium)
Jets to Depots(possibly transferred to a truck if the depot is off-site or
there is a sub-depot) and then trucks for final delivery in the local
area(delivery trucks)
For time-sensitive cargo you can use courtiers and other more expensive
stuff because the total cost is not the ultimate driver, but when you are
dealing with a CEO who needs bulk transport for bottom dollar, automated
is
probably the way to go(at least as far as the local laws allow).
On Wed, Jan 9, 2013 at 10:20 AM, Abrigon <[email protected]> wrote:
Sorry my end is having burps and like..
Not sure if its the cold weather, bad service, or my PC/laptop acting up
again..
I think I was going with the idea that a freighter might be mostly
automated, but an organic element would have to exist to keep hackers
or like from taking over remotely, or corrupting the system and the
system taking over and delivering the cargo with out much effort and
loss of life.
Either from someone boarding the freighter or ..
Mike
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