The Fifth Element - Was Earth Still Doomed?

[Jimmy Higgins]

The Fifth Element was played in the theaters recently for its 25th anniversary. The end of the film the big angry fireball is stopped 62 or so miles from earth (probably one of the only errors by Besson in the film, 6200 miles would have been a bit better). The world is saved, thank goodness!

But much like in Return of the Jedi, where the destruction of the Death Star II likely dooms that planet still, I was wondering, was Earth completely screwed? Firstly, the Moon is like 200,000+ miles from Earth. 62 miles is like right on top of Earth. And because it was projecting towards Earth, it likely has no rotational momentum to hang with Earth to revolve around the sun. So, does this mean the orb will be left behind and waiting to strike Earth in some subsequent revolution or is the orb just going to fall quickly into Earth because of Earth's gravity?

 

[atrib]

I was much more focused on Liloo when I saw the film than on the technical details. I have to go back and watch it again. This was one of the earliest blu ray movies to come out

 

[Politesse]

The Fifth Element was played in the theaters recently for its 25th anniversary. The end of the film the big angry fireball is stopped 62 or so miles from earth (probably one of the only errors by Besson in the film, 6200 miles would have been a bit better). The world is saved, thank goodness!

But much like in Return of the Jedi, where the destruction of the Death Star II likely dooms that planet still, I was wondering, was Earth completely screwed? Firstly, the Moon is like 200,000+ miles from Earth. 62 miles is like right on top of Earth. And because it was projecting towards Earth, it likely has no rotational momentum to hang with Earth to revolve around the sun. So, does this mean the orb will be left behind and waiting to strike Earth in some subsequent revolution or is the orb just going to fall quickly into Earth because of Earth's gravity?

The bulk of the second Death Star and its debris were diverted to another nearby moon by a Republic fleet, an uninhabited watery satellite called Kef Bir. Perhaps future Earth similarly assembled a diversionary fleet to knock the orb into a less perilous orbit. Or, considering mystical space magic was involved from the get go, perhaps the Stones themselves possessed the capacity to push the husk away.

 

[bilby]

The bulk of the second Death Star and its debris were diverted to another nearby moon by a Republic fleet, an uninhabited watery satellite called Kef Bir.

I thought it was called Pocst Hock.

 

[Politesse]

The bulk of the second Death Star and its debris were diverted to another nearby moon by a Republic fleet, an uninhabited watery satellite called Kef Bir.

I thought it was called Pocst Hock.

Perhaps, but even before the new films, I always thought the whole "Endor is Doomed" hot take was dumb. The entire plot of the movie surrounded trying to turn off a planetary shield; they can just turn it back on if they're worried about debris. Or build a new one. They have shields, thr havd tractor beams, this was never an insoluble problem.

 

[Jarhyn]

The bulk of the second Death Star and its debris were diverted to another nearby moon by a Republic fleet, an uninhabited watery satellite called Kef Bir.

I thought it was called Pocst Hock.

Perhaps, but even before the new films, I always thought the whole "Endor is Doomed" hot take was dumb. The entire plot of the movie surrounded trying to turn off a planetary shield; they can just turn it back on if they're worried about debris. Or build a new one. They have shields, thr havd tractor beams, this was never an insoluble problem.

To be fair, it's exactly the sort of collateral damage that would add more realism like "we... How did we not plan for what would happen to the planet below?" And like "we could have cleaned it up if we'd expended the time and resources to prevent it but that never happened" and then allow the empire to make a resurgence by painting the new republic as villains over Endor, while claiming that Alderan never happened.

But that's more KOTOR level writing

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The bulk of the second Death Star and its debris were diverted to another nearby moon by a Republic fleet, an uninhabited watery satellite called Kef Bir.

I thought it was called Pocst Hock.

Perhaps, but even before the new films, I always thought the whole "Endor is Doomed" hot take was dumb. The entire plot of the movie surrounded trying to turn off a planetary shield; they can just turn it back on if they're worried about debris. Or build a new one. They have shields, thr havd tractor beams, this was never an insoluble problem.

But can the shield stand up to a hit of that magnitude? A shield quite adequate to stop any weapon short of the Death Stars themselves would be hopelessly inadequate to deal with that much mass coming down.

 

[skepticalbip]

The bulk of the second Death Star and its debris were diverted to another nearby moon by a Republic fleet, an uninhabited watery satellite called Kef Bir.

I thought it was called Pocst Hock.

Perhaps, but even before the new films, I always thought the whole "Endor is Doomed" hot take was dumb. The entire plot of the movie surrounded trying to turn off a planetary shield; they can just turn it back on if they're worried about debris. Or build a new one. They have shields, thr havd tractor beams, this was never an insoluble problem.

But can the shield stand up to a hit of that magnitude? A shield quite adequate to stop any weapon short of the Death Stars themselves would be hopelessly inadequate to deal with that much mass coming down.

You underestimate the POWER that sci-fi writers have to resolve irresolvable problems.

 

[Politesse]

The bulk of the second Death Star and its debris were diverted to another nearby moon by a Republic fleet, an uninhabited watery satellite called Kef Bir.

I thought it was called Pocst Hock.

Perhaps, but even before the new films, I always thought the whole "Endor is Doomed" hot take was dumb. The entire plot of the movie surrounded trying to turn off a planetary shield; they can just turn it back on if they're worried about debris. Or build a new one. They have shields, thr havd tractor beams, this was never an insoluble problem.

But can the shield stand up to a hit of that magnitude? A shield quite adequate to stop any weapon short of the Death Stars themselves would be hopelessly inadequate to deal with that much mass coming down.

We see those shields take full on collisions with capital ships in some of the Star Wars media; presumably they can handle debris from a disintegrated one?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The bulk of the second Death Star and its debris were diverted to another nearby moon by a Republic fleet, an uninhabited watery satellite called Kef Bir.

I thought it was called Pocst Hock.

Perhaps, but even before the new films, I always thought the whole "Endor is Doomed" hot take was dumb. The entire plot of the movie surrounded trying to turn off a planetary shield; they can just turn it back on if they're worried about debris. Or build a new one. They have shields, thr havd tractor beams, this was never an insoluble problem.

But can the shield stand up to a hit of that magnitude? A shield quite adequate to stop any weapon short of the Death Stars themselves would be hopelessly inadequate to deal with that much mass coming down.

We see those shields take full on collisions with capital ships in some of the Star Wars media; presumably they can handle debris from a disintegrated one?

A capital ship is nothing compared to the Death Star wreckage.

 

[Politesse]

The bulk of the second Death Star and its debris were diverted to another nearby moon by a Republic fleet, an uninhabited watery satellite called Kef Bir.

I thought it was called Pocst Hock.

Perhaps, but even before the new films, I always thought the whole "Endor is Doomed" hot take was dumb. The entire plot of the movie surrounded trying to turn off a planetary shield; they can just turn it back on if they're worried about debris. Or build a new one. They have shields, thr havd tractor beams, this was never an insoluble problem.

But can the shield stand up to a hit of that magnitude? A shield quite adequate to stop any weapon short of the Death Stars themselves would be hopelessly inadequate to deal with that much mass coming down.

We see those shields take full on collisions with capital ships in some of the Star Wars media; presumably they can handle debris from a disintegrated one?

A capital ship is nothing compared to the Death Star wreckage.

Eh, canon is on my side.

 

[bilby]

The bulk of the second Death Star and its debris were diverted to another nearby moon by a Republic fleet, an uninhabited watery satellite called Kef Bir.

I thought it was called Pocst Hock.

Perhaps, but even before the new films, I always thought the whole "Endor is Doomed" hot take was dumb. The entire plot of the movie surrounded trying to turn off a planetary shield; they can just turn it back on if they're worried about debris. Or build a new one. They have shields, thr havd tractor beams, this was never an insoluble problem.

But can the shield stand up to a hit of that magnitude? A shield quite adequate to stop any weapon short of the Death Stars themselves would be hopelessly inadequate to deal with that much mass coming down.

We see those shields take full on collisions with capital ships in some of the Star Wars media; presumably they can handle debris from a disintegrated one?

A capital ship is nothing compared to the Death Star wreckage.

Eh, canon is on my side.

A cannon isn’t even going to dent the deck plates on the Death Star.

 

[Jarhyn]

So, death star derail aside... Yeah, like, that was a solid moon sized mass at an unstable distance.

At that distance it's tidal force would rip up the planet.

 

[Politesse]

Ah, but did it have mass?

 

[Jarhyn]

Ah, but did it have mass?

The implication was that the moon was the remains of the last attempt, and the moon does have mass.

 

[Politesse]

Ah. It was worth a try. Unlike Star Wars, it's been quite a log time since I've seen the Fifth Element. You should see my rendition of the the Diva Solo, though.

 

[Jarhyn]

Ah. It was worth a try. Unlike Star Wars, it's been quite a log time since I've seen the Fifth Element. You should see my rendition of the the Diva Solo, though.

So what you're saying is that I would rather see than hear it?

 

[Politesse]

Ah. It was worth a try. Unlike Star Wars, it's been quite a log time since I've seen the Fifth Element. You should see my rendition of the the Diva Solo, though.

So what you're saying is that I would rather see than hear it?

Well, my falsetto is not bad but the costume is really more what sells it....

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The Fifth Element was played in the theaters recently for its 25th anniversary. The end of the film the big angry fireball is stopped 62 or so miles from earth (probably one of the only errors by Besson in the film, 6200 miles would have been a bit better). The world is saved, thank goodness!

But much like in Return of the Jedi, where the destruction of the Death Star II likely dooms that planet still, I was wondering, was Earth completely screwed? Firstly, the Moon is like 200,000+ miles from Earth. 62 miles is like right on top of Earth. And because it was projecting towards Earth, it likely has no rotational momentum to hang with Earth to revolve around the sun. So, does this mean the orb will be left behind and waiting to strike Earth in some subsequent revolution or is the orb just going to fall quickly into Earth because of Earth's gravity?

Earth has already been devastated at that point. The beam brought the moon to a halt, Newton has something to say to what would happen to the temple and the planet it's sitting on.

And even if it went into orbit at that point the Earth is in serious trouble--it's going to be orbiting in the fringe of Earth's atmosphere, slowly ripping it away.

However, it's not an ordinary moon, since it clearly possesses a stardrive of some type it has it's own strength, it's not merely held by gravity. Thus the Roche limit isn't relevant. It will still raise tides--but it's almost certainly nowhere near the density of a real moon, the tides might not be that bad.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Ah, but did it have mass?

I'm pretty certain there is an image showing the mass increasing after the first missile impact, but I could be thinking of the diameter.