Post
by Mike DiCenso » Thu Feb 13, 2014 7:09 pm
Continuing further research into TOS warp speeds, I found something interesting in the season two episode "The Gamesters of Triskelion". The context is that while preparing to beam down on a mission to Gamma Two, an uninhabited planetoid with an automatic communications and astrogation station, the landing party consisting of Kirk, Chekov, and Uhura are kidnapped by a race of powerful beings called the Providers, who steal members of different races from all over the galaxy and use them for brutal blood sports. Meanwhile Spock, McCoy and Scotty search for their missing crewmates and friends. Here is the relevant interesting dialog during the search:
SPOCK: They are not within the confines of this solar system.
MCCOY: It's been nearly an hour. Can people live that long as disassembled atoms in a transporter beam?
This occurs after the kidnapping of the landing party from off the Enterprise's transporter pad and Kirk and company have been forced to endure brutal induction and training among the Providers' Thralls. Later Spock and the Enterprise crew determine via sensors that the landing party is not in the Gamma system at all and we get this:
SPOCK: Captain's log, stardate 3259.2. First Officer Spock in command. The Captain, Lieutenant Uhura, and Ensign Chekov have been missing for nearly two hours. Computer probability projections are useless due to insufficient data.
HAINES: (A woman in gold uniform at Spock's station) Mister Spock, I'm getting a fluctuating energy reading on this hydrogen cloud. It's faint, sir, but it consistently reads an excess of predictable energy level.
SPOCK: Interesting. It seems to be an ionisation trail.
MCCOY: What would account for that, Spock?
SPOCK: Exactly the question I have just fed to the computers, Doctor. And the answer is, nothing known to us would account for it.
SCOTT: Well, the transporter has neither the power nor the range to account for that.
SPOCK: Plot a follow course, Ensign Haines.
HAINES: (now in Chekov's seat) Aye, sir.
MCCOY: You're going to leave here without them and run off on some wild goose chase halfway across the galaxy just because you found a discrepancy in a hydrogen cloud?
SPOCK: Doctor, I am chasing the Captain, Lieutenant Uhura, and Ensign Chekov, not some wild aquatic fowl. This is the only lead we've had.
HAINES: Course plotted and laid in.
SPOCK: Initiate. Warp factor two.
So they have detected the ionization trail left by the Providers' transport beam and are pursuing off at warp 2 only, and 2 hours has passed from when Kirk and crew, who continue to continue to endure brutal treatment at the hands of the Providers and the Thralls in between when they were captured and when the second piece of relevant dialog occurs. The next important piece comes a short while later:
MCCOY: This is ridiculous. There's nothing out there. Nothing at all.
SCOTT: We certainly seem to be heading into an empty sector.
SPOCK: Projecting back along the path of ionisation, the nearest system is M two four alpha.
SCOTT: That must be two dozen light years away.
SPOCK: Eleven point six three zero.
MCCOY: Are you suggesting that they could have transported over a distance of? You're out of your Vulcan mind, Spock.
SPOCK: I'm suggesting nothing, Doctor. I am merely pursuing the only logical course available to us.
So, only hours are going by, and the ship may still only be at warp 2, but now we know the nearest system is some 11.63 light years away, though it has been some time since the Enterprise left the Gamma system
SPOCK: Mister Scott, can we manage anything faster than warp six?
SCOTT: It's my opinion that we've gone too far as it is, sir.
MCCOY: He's right, Spock. We've lost Jim and the others on Gamma Two. Now you've dragged us a dozen light years on some wild hunch that
SPOCK: Doctor, I do not respond to hunches. No transporter malfunction was responsible for the disappearance. They were not within the Gamma system. A focused beam of extremely high-intensity light was directed into the Gamma system from the trinary system we are now approaching. No known natural phenomena could have caused that beam. Does that clarify the situation?
MCCOY: No, it doesn't. It's still a fancy way of saying that you're playing a hunch. well, my hunch is that they're back on Gamma Two dead or alive and I still want another search.
SCOTT: Doctor McCoy speaks for me, too, sir.
SPOCK: I see. (pause) Gentlemen, I am in command of this vessel, and we shall continue on our present course. (conspiratorial whisper) Unless it is your intention to declare a mutiny.
SCOTT; Mister Spock!
MCCOY: Who said anything about a mutiny, you stubborn, pointed-eared. All right. If we don't find them here, do we still have another search on Gamma Two?
SPOCK: Agreed. Mister Scott, could you manage warp seven?
SCOTT: I would be more than content to do so, sir, and maybe a wee bit more.
SPOCK: Ensign, warp seven.
So the ship may have accelerated or be prepared to go to warp six, but at the end of the conversation is ordered to warp 7, which is not the fastest speed the ship can go, but still on the higher end of things, still there has been some time of searching back along the ionization trail to the star system they are approaching. Finally this after a relatively short interval of Kirk and company attempting escape and enduring yet more brutal treatment:
HAINES: Standard orbit. SPOCK: Sensors indicate only one concentration of life forms on the planet, on the lower hemisphere. Humanoid readings.
MCCOY: Well, at least that gives our landing force a starting point.
So they reach the planet after what cannot be more than mere hours at most and this after accelerating to warp 7 from possibly warp 6, or even just warp 2. So the following can be derived from the episode. Two hours were spent searching the Gamma system looking for the landing party, then the ship sets out across a dozen light years to reach the Providers world of Triskelion, which means based on the events seen and experienced by the landing party and all other dialog, only mere hours went by to cross that distance. There is certainly no indication that a full day went by, or lighting conditions on the planet indicating day-night cycle to show such. So perhaps at most 6 hours total went by, with 4 or so of that of that being the Enterprise making the transit and accelerating from warp 2 to warp 7. So the following: 12 light years x 365 = 4,380 light days. If it took the Enterprise a whole day to get there, that is the lowest warp speed we could reasonably derive from this, but there is no indication of that, so 4,380 light days x 24 = 105,120 light hours. Given that the flow of the search and the training only took about 30 to 40 minutes after the 2 hour estimate is given to search Gamma 2 and the system, it would be tempting to argue for mere minutes, but I feel that would be disingenuous and self-serving. So 10 hours is the number I will use. So 105,120 light hours divided by 10 =
10,512c. This is remarkably close to the low-end average of the "Return to Tomorrow" quote, which in turn helps to establish TOS medium range warp speeds.
So warp 7 = 10,512c