 
ReSent-Message-ID: 
ReSent-Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1992 14:31:47 -0500 (EST)
ReSent-From: "Jon C. Slenk" 
ReSent-To: +dist+/afs/andrew/usr/js9b/Public/camc.dl@andrew.cmu.edu
To: "Jon C. Slenk" 
Subject: Re: another quick question...
From: wce@hogbbs.scol.pa.us (Bill Eichman)
Comments: Validated
Message-Id: 
Date: 	Sat, 14 Nov 1992 18:49:11 -0500
In-Reply-To: 
Organization: The Heart of Gold BBS, Lemont PA

(This was sent to the list several days ago, but hasn't reappeared in
my mailbox. I am resending; apoloogies if this duplicates....)


>From:   O'Hara WtO'_eroAH.n.ngoToxtannumduebbo.Sutealatrvisited
>Bill:  I read your comments on ocean colonization with a great deal of
>interest.  The idea of floating ARKs or self-sustaining communities is
>one I've often thought about since I was a little kid.  My question is
>this:  Would they HAVE to be mobile?  What about used-up ocean oil
>drilling platforms?  They are not as huge as a tanker but stable and
>designed to take a beating.  Is food the limiting factor?  Would the
>area surrounding an ocean platform ever get "Played Out?"

I have learned that there are as many strategies for ocean colonization
as there are thinkers who are dealing with the idea.

I am assuming various teams would have to be assembled to study the
pluses and minuses of these various strategies. That is, someone will
have to study the questions surrounding obtaining and using structures
like drilling platforms.

Such platforms could only ever be a tiny part of a real effort, however.
They are limited in number and more suited to "retreat" than to
colonization.

Stable bases such as these platforms would have to be built as part of a
colonization effort, I would say. These stable bases would be designed
as "servers" for a variety of other permutations of colony.

I concentrate more, for now, on shallow water colonization-- I haven't
studied stilted sea platforms, so, really, I just don't know.

>Have you given thought to the effects of storms/hurricanes on a floating
>colony?

No-one who looks at the idea seriously can fail to give a lot of thought
to questions of weather, corrosion, and so forth. The sea is much more
dangerous than the land.

I think these problems are solved using multiple strategies, including
the following...

   Some places are better than others... leeward of islands, and
   naturally calm regions, will be colonized first.

   Breakwater and artificial lagoon technologies, as T. Starr suggests.

   High-quality satellite tracking and communications, combined with
   various degrees of mobility. Sea colonies would be designed to shut
   down and lock up tight in the face of bad weather.

   Structural designing that takes into account the 100-year storms,
   with combinations of strengthened cores and breakaway peripherals.

   The ultimate protection against storms is found, of course, by going
   _down_. Twenty feet down a region of comparitively utter stability is
   found. To my mind, real ocean colonization, as opposed to occupation
   or hunt-and-gather harvesting, is dependent on acheiving an undersea
   living technology.

Just as with the colonization of the new world, I expect the process to
start with the adventurers and the desperate. They will gather enough
information to arm the entreprenuers.

Just as is occuring with 'space colonization' right now... ocean
colonization is a 'poor man's alternative' to orbital industry and
LaGrange colonies.

What I'm proposing, primarily, is the process of initial R&D. I expect
that initial R&D to be salable, even if all we have to sell are
warnings, and entertainment for the jaded millions.

Later, Bill
wce@hogbbs.scol.pa.us



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