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"There's no point in making a mistake unless you understand the mistake so that you don’t make it again."
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![]() Very cool early Clarke idea to help humans move around in space.
This technovelgy item is used again in 2010: Odyssey Two; this is the one that I remember most vividly. The design had evolved somewhat over the years.
Everything happened in about five seconds. Brailovsky triggered his broomstick, so that it telescoped out to its full length of four metres and made contact with the approaching ship. The broomstick started to collapse, its internal spring absorbing Brailovsky's considerable momentum; but it did not, as Curnow had fully expected, bring him to rest beside the antenna mount. It immediately expanded again, reversing the Russian's velocity so that he was, in effect, reflected away from Discovery just as rapidly as he had approached. He flashed past Curnow, heading out into space again, only a few centimetres away. The startled American just had time to glimpse a large grin before Brailovsky shot past him.
A second later, there was a jerk on the line connecting them, and a quick surge of deceleration as they shared momentum. Their opposing velocities had been neatly cancelled; they were virtually at rest with respect to Discovery. Curnow had merely to reach out to the nearest handhold, and drag them both in.
I had totally forgotten about this idea until I found it on Winchell Chung's cool site.
Compare with the Reaction Pistol from Gordon A. Giles 1937 story Diamond Planetoid, the Personal Jet Thrust from Robert Heinlein's 1948 novel Space Cadet and the Electrical Tether from Garrett P. Serviss' 1898 story Edison's Conquest of Mars Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This | Additional
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