Highly relativistic spaceflight would be fatal for passengers and instruments

Re:Highly relativistic spaceflight would be fatal for passen... by celerity on Monday November 05, 2012 @01:30AM (#4742488)

You know what else is an obstacle to relativistic spaceflight? Being able to do relativistic space flight.

Fun fact: people realized this a long time ago, and proposed different "shields" in front of the ship (it turns out that the most effective shape is a smoothed-out cone [of ice, say] -- see Asimov's Song of a Distant Earth).

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Re:Highly relativistic spaceflight would be fatal for passen... by lucian1900 on Monday November 05, 2012 @04:46AM (#4742858)

Alastair Reynolds describes ice shields in a lot of detail.

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Re:Highly relativistic spaceflight would be fatal for passen... by andrewingram on Monday November 05, 2012 @05:26AM (#4742930)

In Pushing Ice if I recall correctly. Fantastic novel, also discusses the threat of the EM spectrum being blue-shifted to harmful wavelengths.

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Re:Highly relativistic spaceflight would be fatal for passen... by Sharlin on Monday November 05, 2012 @06:15AM (#4743021)

Also with the "lighthuggers" in the Revelation Space universe.

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Re:Highly relativistic spaceflight would be fatal for passen... by squires on Monday November 05, 2012 @10:00AM (#4743739)

This also reminded me of the "Archangel" class ships described in Endymion by Dan Simmons. FTL travel on these ships instantly kills all passengers but then conveniently resurrects them once they reach the destination.

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Re:Highly relativistic spaceflight would be fatal for passen... by Sharlin on Monday November 05, 2012 @06:16AM (#4743023)

Nitpick: The Songs of a Distant Earth is actually by Arthur C. Clarke.

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Re:Highly relativistic spaceflight would be fatal for passen... by celerity on Wednesday November 07, 2012 @09:56PM (#4756335)

Thank you! I always mix them up.

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