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"[Science fiction is] an integration of the mood and attitude of science (the objective universe) with the fears and hopes that spring from the unconscious."
- Gregory Benford
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| Submarine Tube | ||
| A means of transport between Europe and North America via underwater tubes. |
| He stated that more than 3,000 miles of iron tubes, weighing over 13,000,000 tons, were required, with the number of ships necessary, for the transport of this material--200 ships of 2,000 tons, each making thirty-three voyages. He described this Armada of science bearing the steel to two special vessels, on board of which the ends of the tubes were joined to each other, and incased in a triple netting of iron, the whole covered with a resinous preparation to preserve it from the action of the seawater.
 ('An Express of the Future' by Michel Verne) Coming at once to the question of working, he filled the tubes--transformed into a sort of pea-shooter of interminable length--with a series of carriages, to be carried with their travellers by powerful currents of air, in the same way that despatches are conveyed pneumatically round Paris... By the light of an electric lamp in the roof I carefully examined the carriage I was in. Nothing could be more simple: a long cylinder, comfortably upholstered, along which some fifty arm-chairs, in pairs, were ranged in twenty-five parallel ranks. At either end a valve regulated the atmospheric pressure, that at the farther end allowing breathable air to enter the carriage, that in front allowing for the discharge of any excess beyond a normal pressure. |
| Technovelgy from An Express of the Future,
by Michel Verne. Published by The Strand Magazine in 1895 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the sub-Atlantic tunnel from Ralph 124c 41 + (1911) by Hugo Gernsback, the air tunnel from Through the Air Tunnel (19129) by Harl Vincent, the pneumatic tube station from Exiles of the Moon (1931) by Nat Schachner (w. AL Zagat), the pneumatic-tube zone from Mechanocracy (1932) by Miles J. Breuer, the vacuum cylinder from Wandl, The Invader (2839) by Ray Cummings, the vortal tube from Whipping Star (1969) by Frank Herbert, the public vehicle tube from The Houses of Iszm (1954) by Jack Vance, the vacutubes from Double Star (1956) by Robert Heinlein and the bounce tube from Double Star (1956) by Robert Heinlein.
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Additional
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More Ideas
and Technology from An Express of the Future
More Ideas
and Technology by Michel Verne
Tech news articles related to An Express of the Future
Tech news articles related to works by Michel Verne
Submarine Tube-related
news articles:
- Longest Immersed Tunnel Will Connect Denmark and Germany
| Tesla Electric 'Giga Train' Operational In Germany |
| San Francisco Autobus |
| Volvo's Autonomous Truck |
| Eviation Alice Electric Plane First Flight |
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'...the rocket’s landing-arms automatically unfolded.'
'...points and patches of light... sliding all over their faces in a programmed manner that had been designed to foil facial recognition systems.'
'...the combined Wind-Suncatcher, like a spray of tulips mounted fanwise.'
'I went to the control room where the three other men were manipulating their mechanical men.'
'The low-slung monorail car, straddling its single track, bored through the shadows on a slowly rising course.'
'It was a smooth ovoid floating a few inches from the floor...'
'... he thrust in his charging arm to replenish his store of energy.'
'...the terrible Jovian gravity that made each movement an effort.'
