Super-habitats

Lucio,

>On 9/5/06, Darren > wrote:
>(...)
>> Fjords make me think Norway and that makes me wonder, seasons are easy, just
>> change the amount of light per day but what about tropical/temperate/semi
>> arctic zones (I am assuming nobody wants actual arctic.
>(...)

>It occurs to me that some people would like some snowy peaks to break
>their necks in great style. (Or whatever is the goal of people
>practicing skiing. Ice and snow are scary enough thing for an
>inhabitant of the Tropics like me, sliding downhill a snow-covered
>mountain is doubly scary. :-) Tall mountains (like the ones at the
>"wall mountain range" that I proposed in another message) would
>naturally have that.

Canberra is located in what passes for mountains here in Australia (our
mountains would only pass as foothills in most places around 800 metres)
there is snow on the hills around us and on rare occasions in Canberra
itself. I take the family down to the snow (just a few hours away), it is a
lot of fun, so I can see that people will want snow. However, the
end-caps/side-wall/air-curtain (what is the right name? end-caps I suppose
but they do not fully enclose) give you the chance for real extreme skiing,
you could have almost vertical slope, say 80-85 degrees, this would not be
snow (I dont think it would stick) at first but as you dropped down and the
slope changed you would change over to snow. Up high, with an oxygen mask,
coming out of a door in the side of the cliff and begin the long drop. If
the radius is 2,500 Km and we assume that the air is too thin at 25 Km then
you would still be under almost full gravity 99% so you would drop fast,
then you would need a slow change of the slope and gradually you bring it to
around 40 degrees and that would still be a good slope, by having the run
curve you should be able to have a run of 100 Km, the biggest problem would
be how strong your legs were, would you be able to take such a long run?
Mind you there are other possibilities, rather than skiing, how about a
sled, like a skidoo without the motor. Do it right and you could have a ski
run a thousand kilometres long, what a race that you be, add little wings
and put bumps into the track and you could do a bit of gliding, a whole new
sport, a cross between skiing and flying.

Darren