Are Our Sensors Waterproof?
Posted on Tue Jan 17th, 2012 @ 12:42pm by Lieutenant Jimmy Cooper & Captain Elsie Halliwell & Captain T'mpest Michaels
711 words; about a 4 minute read
Mission:
Fishing
Location: Science
Timeline: Current
Science Dept.
After the meeting, Jimmy and Birsi both returned to the Science stations. "All right," Jimmy said to no-one in particular, taking up the Chief Science Officer desk, "How are we going to do this? We have to get as much information as we can up here, and prepare for the eventuality to.. 'swim' down there." Jimmy mused. Of course, he had his own ideas and priorities, but he valued other people's opinions.
"I figured a peek under the sea would be in order to pinpoint those strange readings," Cadet Celik began confidently. "I just wasn't expecting all of us to go. Then again, Ranger is the most versatile, capable sensor platform at our disposal. And this isn't exactly the first time an Intrepid-class starship has doubled as a submarine. Voyager flew into some kind of fluidic space in the Delta Quadrant with no special preparations if I remember correctly. They just couldn't use warp drive. Not that we'd want to do that suborbitally anyway."
"Well it's not as there are huge differences in the sensors used by Federation space and surface ships," Birsi admitted, albeit with an air of something no one would mistake for enthusiasm. "We can't replicate some of their more specialized palettes, but most of them are just contingencies in case the cutting-edge stuff is faulty. I don't see why space-based sensors would have trouble getting through water."
"Could you," Jimmy said to both officers, "find the sensor readings from Voyager and analyse it, and run simulations? I have no intention of finding out down there we're blind in the water."
"Already on it," Celik replied as he moved toward a vacant station.
=^= "Lieutenant Cooper to Commander Michaels," Jimmy called in.
"Michaels here. What can I do for you, Lieutenant?"
"We'd like your assistance in Science, could you come down here?
"On my way. Michaels out."
Five minutes later, T'mpest walked into science. She saw Cooper and walked over to him. "How may I help?" she asked.
"We need to get as much information as possible... I've got them working on scanning underwater, but I'd like some help compensating for that weird warp variance" jimmy explained as he worked the science station from his desk.
"Let's see what you've got so far," T'mpest said, walking over to jimmy.
"The problem," Jimmy moved a little so as to make sure T'mpest could see all, "seems to be in this warp variance here, the Theta bands of the sensors just can't seem to cope with them."
"Ah, yes." She ran a few computations and looked again at the data. "The theta bands aren't able to adjust quickly enough to match the warp variance. If you'll notice, it moves in random increments. You need to add a program to calculate the specific variations and harmonics and adjust accordingly. That way you're not lagging behind." She made a few modifications to the sensors and looked at Jimmy. "Try that. We may need to tweak it again, but this will give us a place to start."
For a while, Jimmy was fixed to the sensors. "Not quite... but at least it doesn't seem as random as before."
"Okay." She made a few more tweaks. "Try it now."
"Ah..." for another while, Jimmy silently concentrated on the sensors, ".. And presto, an image." the image was still blurry in places, but it was a lot better than before.
"I think that's the best we can get," she said after trying several more things. "At least we can work with this. Good job, Jimmy."
"Thanks," Jimmy smiled at the compliment, though he couldn't have done it without the Commander's help. "Status report?" He asked to the small group of people working on underwater scanning.
"It looks like you have things well in hand," T'mpest said after watching Jimmy for a few minutes. "Call me if you need any more help."
With a smile to the others, T'mpest headed back to the bridge.
---
A space-worthy post by
Lieutenant Jimmy Cooper
Chief Science Officer
USS Ranger
Crewmen Birsi and Celik,
PNPC's of Lieutenant Mikaela Stensrud,
Chief Engineering Officer,
USS Ranger
Commander T'mpest Michaels,
First Officer
USS Ranger
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