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>Date: Thu, 3 Jun 93 11:56:22 +0200
>From: mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner)
>Subject: cherryhlist

>> I did not introduce any, I used the one already in place.  The compelling
>> reason, unfortunately, *is* there, given the performance of the ships
>> that Cherryh describes.

From Onno Meyer: 
>Are you sure? Someone found a quote in _Legacy_ that might indicate
>instant acceleration with the jump-engine the same way it can brake.

Exactly, so the technology is already there.  Now all that's necessary is that
the application of jump engines to braking be a minor effort compared
to an actual jump, which is clearly the case (since they don't need to go
outsystem, take drugs, and all that stuff).

>Civilian insystem-ships are described as very slow, and I can't recall
>any story where a rider goes to c-fractional speed with his own engines.

I wasn't talking about the insystem freighters, of course (I was talking
about them in the context of Heavy Time, where I mentioned they had rocket
drives only).  The citations you list would indeed tend to support your view.  
However, in DS, a battle at Pell has the carriers Tibet and North Pole with 
deployed riders trying to break through the Union fleet to rejoin the rest of 
the Company fleet.  Such a maneuver would be completely impossible if the 
riders were limited to, say, 1/1000 the acceleration of a carrier, since the 
Union carriers (of which about a dozen were available) could run rings around 
them.  In effect, deployed riders would make *any* battle a deathtrap for an 
outnumbered carrier.  Also, since they lack the acceleration to try and
evade missiles, they would certainly be the first casualties in any kind
of combat, contradicting the fact that all Company fleet carriers still
have their original riders.  Probably she just didn't think too closely
about these points when she designed the riders.

From Arnulf Guenther:
>Given the fact that this is a
>illustration by David A. Cherry and the frame story in _VL_ I presume
>this woman depicts C.J. Cherryh herself. 

From the photos I have seen, it's a pretty close resemblance.

	Markus