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A momentum inhibitor, perhaps?

Don't forget, the rescue ship (flagship) is about 10 minutes away, even when both are moving toward each other at high speed. The flagship can begin making its turn right away, giving it time to get in position/oriented/moving in the correct direction. I haven't specified the raider's current speed, just that it's at max thrust. I'll need to put a max on the raider's speed, which is easy, since the colission can knock out the thrusters. That means the raider is moving at whatever speed it was going before the collision, and the flagship can, with a bit of handwaving, reach the same speed as the raider, which allows for the tractor beam.

I haven't defined yet why big ships are slower than smaller ships. Momentum may be the key. None of these ships have an upper bound on speed, but the big ships need time to turn or reverse course, so they generally avoid going too fast. In an emergency like this, they would apply whatever thrust is needed to match the speed of the raider.

Does that work?

If I understand the question, it should be a minor effect, since I'm emptying a small ship (holds about 12 people) worth of air over a period of 6-9 minutes (6 minutes to knock em out, 9 minutes to kill em).

It's probably overkill to worry about this, but Kdot mentioned that my characters should have turned into salsa inside the raider they were in when the ship was physically struck by an enemy starfighter. The raider ends up spinning end over end while those inside vomit. They're strapped in so they don't fly out of their seats. Also, there is artificial gravity, although it's largely overwhelmed by the ships crazy spinning. Emergency stabilizers kick in to right the ship. Throughout this, I have an inertial damper (splat inhibiter) in effect inside the ship.

What have I missed? Should I just ignore the splat inhibiter and ignore the inertia?

Thanks
Dirk

For fun, I fed your whole post into Google. No porn this time. Google spat back an error! Wow!

Thanks, Vern. I don't plan to add the extra detail in the story. I just want to be sure I'm portraying it accurately. From what I've read so far, they will pass out before decompression kills them. That's the correct order of events that I was looking for.

Chapter 35, battle chapter two of three, is up.

Not only did I blow my target date by over half a week, but I had to cut the material in half, leaving room for a Joseph chapter.

Thanks.
Dirk

Yikes! Nine pages and counting, with lots left to tell. I'll probably whack it in two and give half to Apollo and the 2nd half to Joseph. That gives me enough room to breathe. This is the climax of the book.

What do you think of this for Joseph's chapter title: The Lord is My Shield, His Words are My Sword? It's for a chapter where Joseph accompanies a squad of marines to seize the enemy flagship. He's never killed before, but he's armed. I wonder what he does. "Thou shall not kill!" remains the likely alternative.

Hmm. Only two pages this evening. Life intrudes and I need to reorder what I've written. Nuts.

Or, since it's Joseph's chapter, we could go with:
- the Lord is my strength and my shield
- the Lord is my shield (not a direct Bible quote, but catchier)
- thou shalt not kill

Either way, my U.S. retirement account is going to take a beating. I was going to sell pending this vote, but was lulled into"do nothing" by pollsters and Wall Street analysts.

I think I mentioned before, but DO NOT forget to file FBAR/FATCA forms by the end of the month.Nasty nasty nasty forms.