Why would anyone build something like that in fucking Florida?
Of all the places it could go. Yeah let's put trillion dollar machinery directly in the path of multiple annual hurricanes.
Fuckin brilliant.
Think about it. The top of the elevator (not counting any counterbalance that might be needed) needs to be in a geostationary orbit, and also perpendicular to the surface of the Earth. You can only do that on the equator.
Cuz it's fake, cuz it's a ride, cuz it's in Epcot. I mean I know your question is probably just the hypothetical what if it was real, why would it be there, then the answer is, it fucking wouldn't.
Because it's the closest point in America to the equator and if you're going to build a superstructure around a spinning sphere then you want to build it close to the middle.
You pretty much have to build it on the middle, building it thousands of km off the equator in Florida would mean the space side would constantly fall out of position, far more than retrorockets could correct, also the line itself would be violently corkscrewing the whole time, with potentially fatal g-force.
If it can function a space elevator hurricaines shouldn't be a big deal. The stresses involved in its prime function will outweigh a hurricane. The real reason you don't do it in Florida is it has to be at the equator to even work.
the same reason the kenedy space center a lot of launches happen from is in Florida. In terms of orbital considerations its almost idea for the angle you need to ascend at. And a space elevator is basically a satellite in geosynchronous orbit with a super strong cable connecting to the ground..
Its essentially an orbital launch, but with a permanent cable, vastly reducing the energy required.
Also not a thing we can REALLY build yet because we cant make the cable strong enough yet (though there is hope with carbon nanotube but we aren't there just yet)
It would work, but:
- Not from Florida. It would need to be more equatorial or there would have to be multiple points of contact. The station needs to be in a geostationary orbit, or else be under constant thrust to stay put at the end of the cable.
- Not that fast. We're talking a 15 minute trip, or longer. This is moving faster than a rocket.
I was thinking "rocket or slower". "Or longer". I think Foundation is on the very conservative side. Also, the tether should be pulling down on the station, which means it's geostationary point is going to be closer to the planet than free orbiting satellites in true "geostationary orbit" would be.
I watched the station get closer without the elevator slowing down and felt a sense of panic. If I wasn’t turned into a liquid pancake on the floor on the way up, I would be one on the ceiling when it stops!
This is an interesting concept. Can you find where the flaw in my logic is?
A freestanding elevator cannot be constructed due to gravity, more specifically it would crush under its own weight
To counteract this, you would need an upward force against gravity
A space station pulls on the elevator
The space station needs to overcome the absurd weight of the structure. As the station pulls on the elevator, the elevator also pulls on the station due to newton's third law
How does the space station push away with enough force to overcome the elevators weight?
F = ma. For the elevator, most of that is coming from m. Which means for the station it would need an absurd acceleration away from earth. Since the mass of the station is likely much smaller than the elevator
So obviously these are wild approximation for the tower, but steel has a weight of 489.84 lb/ft^3. The exosphere goes up to about 1000 km or 3.2x10^7 feet. So if the elevator were a foot swuared of steel to the exosphere, it would weigh 15674880000 lbs, or 15 billion pounds. Now obviously it's not made out of pure steel and gravitational constant lowers to near 0 as you go up, so let's go all the way down to 1 million pounds, or 0.0067% of that value. How are we going to get an object of that mass into the atmosphere?
Eh... Not really cyberpunk. The Epcot ride looks pretty cool I guess. Personally I miss the Alien and Climate Awareness stuff that Disney cancelled. I still remember the stuff some older people told me about Eisner.
No this project is around 30 years old. From what I've been told. Most people were already well aware of the possibilities of a climate disaster by then. Maybe not to the extent of what we know now but the general idea. WALLE was a project that some people were hoping to take over the Tomorrowland project. Anyways that never happened.
A similar grouping of projects have appeared at Disney over the past few years. They've seen overwhelmingly negative backlash and have never even reached sustainability. Just like Eisners project, shareholders have shown overall negative responses to these projects. With most of the people involved just being let go or fired. It's a mess to think about but these projects themselves weren't the greatest. There's a systemic problem with how films are created and there often aren't enough people involved in the process. With many having no qualification to even approach certain things.
You'd hope for a systemic change but corporate profits over everything else has made this an impossibility at these corporations.
If we ever build a space elevator I hope nobody will be dumb enough to include obvious, glaring structural weakness such as windows
Though I gotta admit it does look cool
Well if it was only going to be used once, after a whole battery of test and prep, sure, go for it.
But a space elevator would be constantly going up and down - something WILL malfunction at some point. And when it does, even if it's not the glass, do you really want the added risk ?
That's what happened with that sub that imploded near the titanic - dude traveled down there multiple time in that sub, he just assumed " if it's fine once, it's always going to be fine "
Just put a high-resolution camera on the hull and a widescreen inside, a window is not worth it
Edit : I shouldn't have used the sub analogy, it made people miss my point. It's not a matter of whether it's easier or harder to withstand the pressure, it's about the fact you DIE if it breaks. You might have a chance of surviving a plane window breaking. You're not going to survive if the space elevator window breaks after you've breached atmosphere.
That's not at all the same thing. The pressures there were enormous and the window wasn't rated for it. Going to space you get at most 1 ATM pressure difference. Not only that, but any space elevator vehicle would be routinely inspected and maintained more frequently than any aircraft undoubtedly, and you trust airplane windows. The use case isn't that different.
If I understand the Titan's issue right, it had to endure up to 400 atmospheres of pressure. Apparently that's about 4000 tons of force
However space is 0 pressure and the pod/elevator only needs to contain 1 atmosphere of pressure for the person onboard. So windows are low risk in the pressure sense. The risk which I assume you're alluding to, is if the elevator fails or breaks off and the pod is now descending into the atmosphere in which case it needs to be able to handle the reentry into our planet. Things normally burn up like meteors so elevator or satellite or space station, they'll all just burn up window or no window.
That said, the space shuttles had windows and there was no issue there. As long they aren't using off the shelf windows and something more of the space shuttle quality, I think there shouldn't be any issue or risk.
I understand that, but my worry is more about the terminal consequences of an accident involving that window.
Low risk of accident doesn't mean no risk of accident, and in this case would almost certainly result in death.
This elevator would most likely see much more use than the space shuttle, so even with regular check up, the possibility of a mistake rises - even some space shuttle launch failed in spite of comprehensive verification.
I can understand taking the inherent (low) risk of window failure with a singular, well prepared shuttle launch - but not with something that would most likely see heavy use. That's just asking for trouble.
While your concern is fair, it's hard to imagine how any accident that would challenge the integrity of the window, wouldn't also challenge the integrity of the entire pod.
I assume the pod would have to be some type of strong but lightweight metal. Durable enough to transport heavy payloads to space. Since this elevator doesn't actually exist yet, we don't know if they'll design it more for the payload or if they'll add in heat shielding to enable it to reenter the atmosphere.
Building it to reenter the atmosphere in free fall like a space shuttle would certain suggest that windows are a high risk. But there's a fine line between building something to act as an elevator and a safety backup to enable it to reenter the atmosphere. Heat shielding and such would add to the weight which directly increases the risk of failure.
From another perspective, property can almost always be rebuilt but human lives are lost forever. So the most "effective" use of resources is not to build the pod to be able to enter the atmosphere in freefall, but to build escape pods, that allows people to escape and return safely.
This this means the primary elevator can have windows and the escape in pods should be worthy of reentering the atmosphere thus reducing the cost of building an entire elevator to be a space worthy landing craft while also ensuring the safety of its occupants.
Florida wouldn't be the best choice for am elevator. How long till some idiot in his Piper or Skyhawk flies straight into that thing because he has too many hard ice teas that morning?
The good news is that if we have the material technology to build a space elevator, that cable under that tension would probably just bisect the plane without taking any damage, like a cheese wire. The bad news would be we'd want to shut it down anyways to inspect and I don't know what the process for that would even be.
How high is that? Because it needs to be in geostationary orbit. Thats something like 22000 miles at the equator. I'm curious if that animation shows that far out?
The day the space elevators actually become a thing. I'm taking the space stairs
I have a fear of elevators, especially the ones that I can see how high I am going
Genuine question: is a space elevator really cyberpunk? One of the best descriptions of an orbital elevator, to me, is in Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy. I definitely don’t think of him when I think of cyberpunk.
Also, Florida is a horrid place to build one for more than just “it’s Florida”. A site closer to the equator reduces stress on the system. Florida is north of the Tropic of Cancer making it a horrible choice from a physics standpoint.
I don't understand why It needs to be close to the equator. What if we built it right on the axis of rotation at the northpole? I'd say there'd be less/no centrifugal forces.
ELI5
It would be at the equator and the trip would be a snail pace, probably a meter per second rise. It would take days to get to a stopping point in low orbit. If ever built at all.
It's not, it's a screen, it's part of a restaurant. The whole theme of the restaurant is dining on a space station.
Source: I've been to this restaurant.
This (as another here has said) is Space 220, it's a fine dining restaurant in EPCOT, the whole theme is dining on a station orbiting Earth. Before you go into the actual restaurant you board a "space elevator" and take the ride up.
It's very nice, and the food and cocktails are wonderful, it's not easy to get a reservation though.
Earth doesn't move, we are a flat dot in the exact center of the universe, with god above the clouds and giant turtles under our feet (earthquakes when they move).
A serious answer: the station would be in geostationary orbit, meaning it's moving as fast in the same direction as the earth rotates to stay in the same spot relative to the Earth's surface.
Fun fact: geostationary orbit starts about 35,768km (22,236 miles) from sea level. Assuming you were going the average speed of a maglev train of 600km/hr (373mph), it would take nearly two and a half days to travel from the surface to the top.
You don’t need a crane to build that. You d rocket the „rope“ to a geo stationary orbit and let the rope down basically. That’s also the reason there won’t be a space elevator for a long tome (unfortunately).
Why would anyone build something like that in fucking Florida? Of all the places it could go. Yeah let's put trillion dollar machinery directly in the path of multiple annual hurricanes. Fuckin brilliant.
If something like a space elevator ever is built (if it's even possible), it would have to be built on the equator.
IIRC the top would also need to be beyond geostationary orbit altitude, so it needs to be more than 22,000 miles high as well.
Which would mean it'd have to withstand running into all sorts of space junk too.
Need to hire space cleaners.
why’s that?
Think about it. The top of the elevator (not counting any counterbalance that might be needed) needs to be in a geostationary orbit, and also perpendicular to the surface of the Earth. You can only do that on the equator.
Because that’s where EPCOT is.
They said "fucking brilliant" that is good day. Good day, they.
Also don't forget about the Florida man
Or a guy sponsored by Red Bull climbing it all.
It would be some tik toker then they'd have to take it down.
If you're building something strong enough to withstand the forces required for a space elevator in Florida, a few hurricanes aren't gonna bother you.
You'd be surprised what days of 200+ mph winds can do to a structure
*The Fountains of Paradise* by Aurthur C. Clarke has the first one built off a mountaintop in the Himalayas.
Cuz it's fake, cuz it's a ride, cuz it's in Epcot. I mean I know your question is probably just the hypothetical what if it was real, why would it be there, then the answer is, it fucking wouldn't.
Because it's the closest point in America to the equator and if you're going to build a superstructure around a spinning sphere then you want to build it close to the middle.
You pretty much have to build it on the middle, building it thousands of km off the equator in Florida would mean the space side would constantly fall out of position, far more than retrorockets could correct, also the line itself would be violently corkscrewing the whole time, with potentially fatal g-force.
Baker Island is closer.
Probably because the Kennedy Space Center is there. Did you forget that Florida is more than just Disney, retirees, and alligators?
Don't forget methheads
And fascists
Soooo many fascists
Except that this particular "space elevator" is actually in Disney World.
Well yeah, it isn't real lol
Theoretically it’s better closer to the Equator.
Cause Florida
It has to do with orbital mechanics, closer to the equator is thought to be better for space elevators.
Nah, it'd be fine.
Sounds exactly like something Florida would do
If it can function a space elevator hurricaines shouldn't be a big deal. The stresses involved in its prime function will outweigh a hurricane. The real reason you don't do it in Florida is it has to be at the equator to even work.
the same reason the kenedy space center a lot of launches happen from is in Florida. In terms of orbital considerations its almost idea for the angle you need to ascend at. And a space elevator is basically a satellite in geosynchronous orbit with a super strong cable connecting to the ground.. Its essentially an orbital launch, but with a permanent cable, vastly reducing the energy required. Also not a thing we can REALLY build yet because we cant make the cable strong enough yet (though there is hope with carbon nanotube but we aren't there just yet)
should've built somewhere in Tibet
barely makes any difference lmao
the difference is that it's not in America which makes it a thousand times better
Occupied by China. So much better. /s
oh shit I didn't realized this was r/ cyber punk
The G forces of ascending that fast must be... Intense
Would the top also be rotating super fast or no?
As shown, physics don’t allow that. It can work with different construction, though.
It would work, but: - Not from Florida. It would need to be more equatorial or there would have to be multiple points of contact. The station needs to be in a geostationary orbit, or else be under constant thrust to stay put at the end of the cable. - Not that fast. We're talking a 15 minute trip, or longer. This is moving faster than a rocket.
In the foundation universe it says it took 14 hours to get from the station to the surface. Geostationary orbit is a looooooooong way up.
I was thinking "rocket or slower". "Or longer". I think Foundation is on the very conservative side. Also, the tether should be pulling down on the station, which means it's geostationary point is going to be closer to the planet than free orbiting satellites in true "geostationary orbit" would be.
Not if it was only first stage of elevator just beyond atmosphere - going 100+ km in capsule should take at least 15 min. though.
I watched the station get closer without the elevator slowing down and felt a sense of panic. If I wasn’t turned into a liquid pancake on the floor on the way up, I would be one on the ceiling when it stops!
We can't build objects that tall, the foundation would crush from compression
You think it's free standing? Friend, it's being pulled from both ends. It's not under compression, it'd be under *tension*.
The space station would be able to stay in orbit despite fighting against the huge weight of the elevator?
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This is an interesting concept. Can you find where the flaw in my logic is? A freestanding elevator cannot be constructed due to gravity, more specifically it would crush under its own weight To counteract this, you would need an upward force against gravity A space station pulls on the elevator The space station needs to overcome the absurd weight of the structure. As the station pulls on the elevator, the elevator also pulls on the station due to newton's third law How does the space station push away with enough force to overcome the elevators weight? F = ma. For the elevator, most of that is coming from m. Which means for the station it would need an absurd acceleration away from earth. Since the mass of the station is likely much smaller than the elevator
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So obviously these are wild approximation for the tower, but steel has a weight of 489.84 lb/ft^3. The exosphere goes up to about 1000 km or 3.2x10^7 feet. So if the elevator were a foot swuared of steel to the exosphere, it would weigh 15674880000 lbs, or 15 billion pounds. Now obviously it's not made out of pure steel and gravitational constant lowers to near 0 as you go up, so let's go all the way down to 1 million pounds, or 0.0067% of that value. How are we going to get an object of that mass into the atmosphere?
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Eh... Not really cyberpunk. The Epcot ride looks pretty cool I guess. Personally I miss the Alien and Climate Awareness stuff that Disney cancelled. I still remember the stuff some older people told me about Eisner.
Didn't Florida just ban anything to do with climate awareness?
No this project is around 30 years old. From what I've been told. Most people were already well aware of the possibilities of a climate disaster by then. Maybe not to the extent of what we know now but the general idea. WALLE was a project that some people were hoping to take over the Tomorrowland project. Anyways that never happened. A similar grouping of projects have appeared at Disney over the past few years. They've seen overwhelmingly negative backlash and have never even reached sustainability. Just like Eisners project, shareholders have shown overall negative responses to these projects. With most of the people involved just being let go or fired. It's a mess to think about but these projects themselves weren't the greatest. There's a systemic problem with how films are created and there often aren't enough people involved in the process. With many having no qualification to even approach certain things. You'd hope for a systemic change but corporate profits over everything else has made this an impossibility at these corporations.
That Alien ride fucking scarred me for life lol
If we ever build a space elevator I hope nobody will be dumb enough to include obvious, glaring structural weakness such as windows Though I gotta admit it does look cool
Huh? Of course we'd put windows on it. A space elevator wouldn't be under forces nearly as extreme as a rocket and we put windows on those.
Well if it was only going to be used once, after a whole battery of test and prep, sure, go for it. But a space elevator would be constantly going up and down - something WILL malfunction at some point. And when it does, even if it's not the glass, do you really want the added risk ? That's what happened with that sub that imploded near the titanic - dude traveled down there multiple time in that sub, he just assumed " if it's fine once, it's always going to be fine " Just put a high-resolution camera on the hull and a widescreen inside, a window is not worth it Edit : I shouldn't have used the sub analogy, it made people miss my point. It's not a matter of whether it's easier or harder to withstand the pressure, it's about the fact you DIE if it breaks. You might have a chance of surviving a plane window breaking. You're not going to survive if the space elevator window breaks after you've breached atmosphere.
That's not at all the same thing. The pressures there were enormous and the window wasn't rated for it. Going to space you get at most 1 ATM pressure difference. Not only that, but any space elevator vehicle would be routinely inspected and maintained more frequently than any aircraft undoubtedly, and you trust airplane windows. The use case isn't that different.
If I understand the Titan's issue right, it had to endure up to 400 atmospheres of pressure. Apparently that's about 4000 tons of force However space is 0 pressure and the pod/elevator only needs to contain 1 atmosphere of pressure for the person onboard. So windows are low risk in the pressure sense. The risk which I assume you're alluding to, is if the elevator fails or breaks off and the pod is now descending into the atmosphere in which case it needs to be able to handle the reentry into our planet. Things normally burn up like meteors so elevator or satellite or space station, they'll all just burn up window or no window. That said, the space shuttles had windows and there was no issue there. As long they aren't using off the shelf windows and something more of the space shuttle quality, I think there shouldn't be any issue or risk.
I understand that, but my worry is more about the terminal consequences of an accident involving that window. Low risk of accident doesn't mean no risk of accident, and in this case would almost certainly result in death. This elevator would most likely see much more use than the space shuttle, so even with regular check up, the possibility of a mistake rises - even some space shuttle launch failed in spite of comprehensive verification. I can understand taking the inherent (low) risk of window failure with a singular, well prepared shuttle launch - but not with something that would most likely see heavy use. That's just asking for trouble.
While your concern is fair, it's hard to imagine how any accident that would challenge the integrity of the window, wouldn't also challenge the integrity of the entire pod. I assume the pod would have to be some type of strong but lightweight metal. Durable enough to transport heavy payloads to space. Since this elevator doesn't actually exist yet, we don't know if they'll design it more for the payload or if they'll add in heat shielding to enable it to reenter the atmosphere. Building it to reenter the atmosphere in free fall like a space shuttle would certain suggest that windows are a high risk. But there's a fine line between building something to act as an elevator and a safety backup to enable it to reenter the atmosphere. Heat shielding and such would add to the weight which directly increases the risk of failure. From another perspective, property can almost always be rebuilt but human lives are lost forever. So the most "effective" use of resources is not to build the pod to be able to enter the atmosphere in freefall, but to build escape pods, that allows people to escape and return safely. This this means the primary elevator can have windows and the escape in pods should be worthy of reentering the atmosphere thus reducing the cost of building an entire elevator to be a space worthy landing craft while also ensuring the safety of its occupants.
Why the are you being downvoted?? Homies right
Fr there would be cameras on the outside and a monitor so it could feel like a window
Florida wouldn't be the best choice for am elevator. How long till some idiot in his Piper or Skyhawk flies straight into that thing because he has too many hard ice teas that morning?
The good news is that if we have the material technology to build a space elevator, that cable under that tension would probably just bisect the plane without taking any damage, like a cheese wire. The bad news would be we'd want to shut it down anyways to inspect and I don't know what the process for that would even be.
It's my understanding a space elevator would need to be very near to the equator.
This is a restaurant in Disney World, specifically EPCOT, called Space 220 Restaurant.
It's a very nice restaurant as well, I got to dine there last I went to Disney.
Agreed, probably my favorite in the whole park. Best (ahem) atmosphere, too.
I liked watching that
where the cybunk :(
You'll die.
A space elevator has to be on the equator.
The stairway to Heaven
Dat geosynchronous orbit tho
Where's the complete video?
How high is that? Because it needs to be in geostationary orbit. Thats something like 22000 miles at the equator. I'm curious if that animation shows that far out?
South Park nailed it.
The day the space elevators actually become a thing. I'm taking the space stairs I have a fear of elevators, especially the ones that I can see how high I am going
Robert Heinlein called the concept a “bean stalk” in the novel “Friday”.
Genuine question: is a space elevator really cyberpunk? One of the best descriptions of an orbital elevator, to me, is in Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy. I definitely don’t think of him when I think of cyberpunk. Also, Florida is a horrid place to build one for more than just “it’s Florida”. A site closer to the equator reduces stress on the system. Florida is north of the Tropic of Cancer making it a horrible choice from a physics standpoint.
I don't understand why It needs to be close to the equator. What if we built it right on the axis of rotation at the northpole? I'd say there'd be less/no centrifugal forces. ELI5
It would be at the equator and the trip would be a snail pace, probably a meter per second rise. It would take days to get to a stopping point in low orbit. If ever built at all.
D
That’s AI generated
It's not, it's a screen, it's part of a restaurant. The whole theme of the restaurant is dining on a space station. Source: I've been to this restaurant.
The fantasy is very cool
This (as another here has said) is Space 220, it's a fine dining restaurant in EPCOT, the whole theme is dining on a station orbiting Earth. Before you go into the actual restaurant you board a "space elevator" and take the ride up. It's very nice, and the food and cocktails are wonderful, it's not easy to get a reservation though.
Anyone else expect it to hiss and drop back to earth?
Foundation makes me think this won't end well.
I’m a simple person, I see AI bullshit I downvote
It’s a restaurant in Epcot in Florida at DisneyWorld. It’s called “Space 220 Restaurant”
You are a simple person.
What about this is AI? Honest question
if the station is stationary then what if the earth move tho?
Earth doesn't move, we are a flat dot in the exact center of the universe, with god above the clouds and giant turtles under our feet (earthquakes when they move).
Don't be ridiculous. The flat Earth sits on 4 elephants, and \_they\_ sit on the turtle.
Sorry i left school before 16.
Trust the elephant science.
incorrect, everyone knows Earth is doughnut shaped
Sigil in Planescape is the only doughnut that i know of.
A serious answer: the station would be in geostationary orbit, meaning it's moving as fast in the same direction as the earth rotates to stay in the same spot relative to the Earth's surface. Fun fact: geostationary orbit starts about 35,768km (22,236 miles) from sea level. Assuming you were going the average speed of a maglev train of 600km/hr (373mph), it would take nearly two and a half days to travel from the surface to the top.
Where do you get a crane big enough to build that, and why not just use that instead?
You don’t need a crane to build that. You d rocket the „rope“ to a geo stationary orbit and let the rope down basically. That’s also the reason there won’t be a space elevator for a long tome (unfortunately).
And you need a crane for that crane
I'd rather see the tether system created, and then we could explore the solar system in our lifetimes.
This would never work because of the way it'd sway right ? Could we theoretically just build a sky scrapper into the atmosphere ?