Justice in early Starfleet

[Cogito]

There's no space jail so would he be sentenced to Enterprises' brig or would his shipmates be responsible for his incarceration?

There's always airlock 7...

I can see the airlock solution as seeming viable but I can't see T'Pol going along with that even though he assaulted her. She seemed fine with the let him go scenario but if punishment were given I would think she would be more for sending him to the priests, as incidents from all the Trek series seem to show that Vulcans treated most deviant behavior by training/retraining or manipulating the mind in some way. As far as him presenting the unleashing of a great evil, hopefully Archer did tell the captain of the Vosh Katur why they were being asked to leave suddenly. I know they were already leaving but Archer did give the impression that their departure was hastened because of Tolaris' actions. A Vulcan with deviant behavior and anger control issues poses a threat to his crew; as well as; others so I would hope the incidents weren't kept secret from Tolaris' crew. To me not informing/warning them would be criminal. For a group that was experimenting with control issues etc... you'd think they'd want to know that one of them was possibly ill or experiencing issues.

What T'Pol wants, and what I want (and by extension, what my proxies among the human crew want) are two different things. I don't know whether it's in canon but I've read many times that the boomer response would be to space the guilty person. Don't ask me to push the button in real life, but from behind the screen - hell yeah. And in fact this is the only way I can rationalise Archer's behaviour - a need to see Tolaris violently attack somebody just to confirm beyond doubt that he's capable of what T'Pol accused him of. That done, in my little pocket universe, the only decision is whether justice will be served within starfleet regulations, or outside them. And evidently, as it turns out, the answer is not to deal with this via starfleet regs. Can you imagine Archer, OR Trip, OR Reed, just turning the other cheek after somebody has violently assaulted a female member of the crew in this way? The more I think about it the more certain I am that Tolaris is due to leave the ship by the wrong airlock.

[Kotik]

I don't think the ENT crew would comit outright murder, but I'd be more inclined to believe that the Vulcans would boot him out the airlock. in "Kir'Shara" V'Las mentions that there are still crimes on Vulcan that are punishable by death. I would believe that such an assault, mentally or physically would be one of them.

[Snorpenbass]

And on a "why real physics are rarely used in space shows" note, fun fact: the amount of air expelled from your average movie airlock is nowhere near large enough to cause any kind of expulsion the way it always happens in TV shows and movies. More likely is that the guy will die a slow death while drifting slowly out the airlock...

...and then he'll probably orbit the ship for some time due to its gravitational pull being just about strong enough to capture a small man-sized object already moving fairly leisurely...

In other words, spacing someone is a good way to have somebody drift by the mess hall window at the wrong time.

"Where's Tolaris?"
"...I think ensign Rodriguez mentioned him floating past her quarters yesterday. Why?"

[Distracted]

That is SO disgusting. I'm not sure why it makes me giggle.

[Snorpenbass]

That is SO disgusting. I'm not sure why it makes me giggle.

My work here is done! *dramatic music plays as I gather my cape and fly off into the distance...or something*

Anyway, for a more horrifying and slightly more realistic look at someone being spaced, there's the infamous scene in Event Horizon where a crew member finds himself in an airlock that's about to open...and he's not wearing a suit.

I think we should be happy the scene didn't *also* include the effects of ambient radiation and the outer space temperature extremes on the human body, is all I'm saying...

[Kevin Thomas Riley]

At the very least Archer should have informed the captain of the V'tosh ka'tur ship about what Tolaris did.

[WarpGirl]

That's something I couldn't believe they never showed. I mean Tolaris was dangerous to everyone not just beautiful Vulcan women.

[Kotik]

And on a "why real physics are rarely used in space shows" note, fun fact: the amount of air expelled from your average movie airlock is nowhere near large enough to cause any kind of expulsion the way it always happens in TV shows and movies. More likely is that the guy will die a slow death while drifting slowly out the airlock...

...and then he'll probably orbit the ship for some time due to its gravitational pull being just about strong enough to capture a small man-sized object already moving fairly leisurely...

In other words, spacing someone is a good way to have somebody drift by the mess hall window at the wrong time.

"Where's Tolaris?"
"...I think ensign Rodriguez mentioned him floating past her quarters yesterday. Why?"

You sure about that? Depending on how quickly they can open it, even a small amount of air, explosively released into the vacuum should blow that critter into the middle of next week. And I don't think the death will be slow (unfortunately), because he'll be lunconscious in a matter of seconds, not to talk about his lungs exploding, if there's any air in them left. Not sure a ship would create that kind a gravity.

[Kevin Thomas Riley]

Explosive decompression: what happens if you expose a human to vacuum without a space suit?

[Cogito]

I don't think the ENT crew would comit outright murder, but I'd be more inclined to believe that the Vulcans would boot him out the airlock. in "Kir'Shara" V'Las mentions that there are still crimes on Vulcan that are punishable by death. I would believe that such an assault, mentally or physically would be one of them.

I'd almost forgotten writing this all those months ago. I didn't name names because the point of this drabble was that you had to guess, but now I can tell you that the narrator was Hess and she was watching an exchange between Trip and Malcolm.

"He WHAT!???"
The sudden exclamation caught everyone's attention. The door slammed open and the Chief stormed out. I'd never seen him look so grim.
"Where are you going?"
He turned back to the office.
"You stay here. You can't be involved in any of this."
Then he turned to me.
"You're with me. Clear the corridor between C3 and the brig. I don't care how you do it, just do it. Right now."
C3. Portside airlock. What would he want with an airlock?
"Wait. Wait!"
The Chief turned back impatiently. "What?"
"He isn't in the brig. He let him go."

[Snorpenbass]

And on a "why real physics are rarely used in space shows" note, fun fact: the amount of air expelled from your average movie airlock is nowhere near large enough to cause any kind of expulsion the way it always happens in TV shows and movies. More likely is that the guy will die a slow death while drifting slowly out the airlock...

...and then he'll probably orbit the ship for some time due to its gravitational pull being just about strong enough to capture a small man-sized object already moving fairly leisurely...

In other words, spacing someone is a good way to have somebody drift by the mess hall window at the wrong time.

"Where's Tolaris?"
"...I think ensign Rodriguez mentioned him floating past her quarters yesterday. Why?"

You sure about that? Depending on how quickly they can open it, even a small amount of air, explosively released into the vacuum should blow that critter into the middle of next week. And I don't think the death will be slow (unfortunately), because he'll be lunconscious in a matter of seconds, not to talk about his lungs exploding, if there's any air in them left. Not sure a ship would create that kind a gravity.

Well, I once read a very detailed and math-heavy discussion of the matter (airlock spacing of persons) by real professional physicists, and fact of the matter is, the air expelled through the opening of the average-sized airlock simply doesn't have the mass necessary to cause an expulsion at that speed, no matter how fast the doors open.

As for unconscious in seconds, that depends on if he holds his breath or not (as in, you stay conscious longer if you *exhale*, not the opposite). But really, the effects are greatly exaggerated in most stories. Your lungs don't literally explode that way, and in fact the most immediate threat to your body is extreme cold or heat (depending on if you're in shadow or light at the time) and ambient radiation. The most accurate depiction yet is the one in Kubrick's 2001, when Bowman has to remove his suit and go through an (interior) area in vacuum to disable HAL.

And as for gravity, the real-life astronauts found very quickly that dropping things on space-walks in micro-gravity meant the things kept orbiting the vehicles (and throwing properly is difficult when the force used is equally pushed back at the one throwing). Scale that up to a ship the size of the NX-01, and you have corpsicle satellites.

[WarpGirl]

Don't ask me why I automatically assumed this but I always thought that if someone got "spaced" they'd suffocate and be frozen almost right away. So they'd be a like corpse in a freezer.

[Silverbullet]

WG, that is what I have always thought too. Instant popsicle. Although I have wondered about the internal pressure of a body when the external pressure was gone. (NO external pressure in a vacuum. so does the body explode?

SB

[Cogito]

I think other posts on this thread have already referred to scientific studies into exactly what would happen. But you can get pretty close to a vacuum on earth without any great difficulty, and anyone who has stuck their hand over the end of a vacuum pipe can tell you that flesh and skin is strong enough to cope with a vacuum without simply exploding in a grotesque Hollywood special effects sort of way. As the other posts have said - you would probably die from burst lungs if you tried to hold your breath, and many of the smaller blood vessels would probably rupture as your blood boiled, but I don't imagine there would be much large scale damage apart from that.

[Silverbullet]

Cogito, wonder who will be the first volunteer to test those theories.

It has been 60 years since I studied any of this and there has been vast changes. When I first started reading SciFi some writers still thought that Venus was a swamp world.

Tom