On 27Feb2018 1431, Richard Aiken wrote:

> Not sure how they get that flight duration, by the way. A standard
> air/raft's top speed is ~62 mph. Even assuming that it's only going as far
> as Low Earth Orbit, that it can rise vertically the whole way and that it
> doesn't need to accelerate to orbital speed (since it "weighs" nothing at
> all), that's still a trip duration of ~19 hours from sea level on Earth.

Umm. At 62 mph (which in some editions of Traveller is much lower than
the maximum speed) it's only 2-3 hours to LEO. Also, at even 0.1G it
only takes 2-3 hours to make orbital speeds. The whole process therefore
probably takes about 5 hours, and the most difficult part would be
getting into the right place on the right orbit with the crappy
instruments air/rafts are generally assumed to have.

--
Rupert Boleyn <xxxxxx@gmail.com>
Chief Assistant to the Assistant Chief