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"Science fiction writers, I am sorry to say, really do not know anything. We can't talk about science, because our knowledge of it is limited and unofficial, and usually our fiction is dreadful."
- Philip K. Dick
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| Torchship | ||
| A spaceship capable of high acceleration. |
This word paints a wonderful picture; a rocket looks like an upside-down torch, rising on its tail of flames.
| FORTY-SEVEN minutes later they were being packed into the scout torchship Salamander. She was in orbit close by; Joe, Kleuger, and their handlers came by tube linking the hub of the Station to her airlock. Joe was weak and dopy from a thorough washing-out plus a dozen treatments and injections. A good thing, he thought, that light-off would be automatic. The ship was built for high boost; controls were over the pilots’ tanks, where they could be fingered without lifting a hand. The flight surgeon and an assistant fitted Kleuger into one tank while two medical technicians arranged Joe in his. He held a torcher's contempt for the vast distance itself. Older pilots thought of interplanetary trips with a rocketman's bias, in terms of years—trips that a torchship with steady acceleration covered in days. |
| Technovelgy from Sky Lift,
by Robert Heinlein. Published by Imagination in 1953 Additional resources -
|
Another (more complete) description comes from Heinlein's later novel Double Star:
See Bussard ramjet for a form of propulsion capable of even higher speeds.
"The Can Do - that's this bucket - is about to rendezvous with the Go For Broke, which is a high-gee torchship. About seventeen seconds and a gnat's wink after we make contact the Go For Broke will torch for Mars - for we've got to be there by Wednesday."
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'...it was all composed of tiny, identical cubes, carefully laid to form a tilelike surface.'
'He carried on his person a triggering mechanism sensitive to his heartbeat.'
'...Anything was possible in my imaginary environment.'
'Somewhere in space, a chrome and blue automobile raced the green light of Earth.'
'That explains how it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair...'
'We had discovered that metal was relatively impervious to the telepathic effect.'
'Detailed plans for the construction of the Gundstetter-Halone warp drive were flowing.'
