NationStates Jolt Archive

HIFEX NEWS AGENCY: ELDAIMOVEY ADVANCED RESEARCH LABORATORIES (EARL), SCHULTARIA PRIME (09:22 SCT)


-Available for International Release...


Schultarian Government Approves Tevan'aketsan Climate Induction Device Funding:
-Controversy Over Development Prompts Debate, Fears of Misuse


In a small ceremony at approximately eight thirty this morning, a dozen scientists and leading bureaucrats from the Schultarian Central Scientific Collective attended the formal signing ceremony approving Schultaria Prime's newest space-based objective. Held in Eldaimovey's International Visitors' Center, the proceedings were capped off with official ratification of the National Assembly's funding approval by Director Sarnow Haarvekord, in lieu of Central Director Schultz, and presentation of the first series of federal grants totaling some three hundred and fifty million merlons (633.5 million USD). After the official ceremonies, a small press conference was held for local public and private media stressing the benefits of this significant alignment of funds:

”After the catastrophe of the Firestorm of Famine, it has been the goal of this nation to use its technical and theoretical resources in selfless devotion to restoring the fertile lands so bitterly lost last year. Thanks in large part to donations by foreign governments, especially those of Sharina and Manhattan Prime, such resources are now being devoted to making the lands of Schultaria even more virile than ever before. This project, done under careful and methodical means with the utmost emphasis on transparency, will help to revive our nation's agricultural crises in record speed,” noted Director Haarvekord in a prepared statement on live television feeds throughout the Schultarian nation, stressing the benefits of this research as beneficial for the well being of the nation's biological and mechanical energy independence.

Despite assurances by the federal government to insure that the project would remain carefully monitored by independent observers to insure “fair, transparent, and civil” motives to the research, many leading environmental and military interest groups are watching the progress of this research with weariness and caution.

-Produce, or Pestilence?

Dalchen Kamthal, a leading spokesperson for the watchdog group Defenstraata daloc Civisnaata (Military for Pro-Civilian Aims), expressed the concerns of many advocacy groups in a speech held counter to the conference earlier today. ”We wish to say that we do not oppose the scientists for their research goals, but we feel that perhaps less drastic and hopefully less costly methods performed by other research groups could lead to the same biological ends,” he commented on the afternoon news show “Daily Policy” held in Schultaria Prime, Schultaria Prime, ”There is a wealth of technology that we can apply from our urban planning projects, along with the research given to us by the Sharinans, that could easily supplant the losses of our farmland while at the same time allowing more cultivated farmland to return to a biologically self-sufficient state.”

When asked for comment to Kamthal's statements, the Schultarian Central Scientific Collective acknowledged Kamthal's concerns in a formal written message to the Hifex News Agency, stressing that this funding would only be to produce prototypes of possible climate induction devices and not any deployable production models until “more environmental data about such types of artificial induction can be sufficiently prepared and analyzed.”

Office of the Central Directorate: Schultaria Prime, Schultaria Prime

In the deep halls of Schultaria Prime's imposing center of government, Piter Menyn stood quietly on the third floor beside a rather ordinary looking enclave of entrances to several rather nondescript offices. Many of them, with words like “Budgetary Assessments” and “Interior Management” printed in gold leaf on their frosted glass, only hinted at the true level of their involvement in the national affairs of the Schultarian nation. These words meant only brief mention to the permanent denizens of the building, and barely received any attention from the dozens of suited functionaries passing by his silent vigil. To Menyn, however, this was a world altogether alien yet strangely alluring; a considerable change from his normal routine of filling out research reports and grading assignments as a Physics Professor of the University of Schultaria Prime – Heerllu.

Standing in a black synthfiber longcoat, the Doctor leaned himself uneasily against the stratified marble walls with granite inlay, both terrified and anxious at his eventual meeting. Brought up an ardent believer in the civic duties of Schultaria Prime, he was awed by the sheer vastness and power that the federal bureaucracy held behind these glass doors, and this awe had turned into intimidation some weeks ago when a letter from the Education Ministry prompted his “immediate presence” for a “review of [the professor's] academic conduct.” Even for tenured positions, the government's mere interest in the lives of some of the more dishonest members of Schultarian Academia has resulted in a significant number of coincidental resignations, negative publicity, and even international blacklisting at the most prestigious research institutions across the modern world. None of this was lost on the Professor as he paged through what he thought might be the last defense of his academic career. Sighing about the uncertainty of his fate, a young and rather thin looking bureaucrat stepped out of the door, his tall frame jutting at least ten centimeters above the professor's neatly trimmed hair.

“Sir, the secretary will now see you.”

Ushered into the room by a local attendant, Menyn was overwhelmed by the size of the room he had been escorted into; at no less than ten meters wide in every possible direction, including height, this was completely unlike any other office he had ever seen. Looking at the wall where both he and his attendant just entered, Piter's jaw dropped in amazement; row upon row of books, many of them beautifully bound in painstakingly fine leather backing, adorned a library that reached all the way to the very top of the room's long and wispy heights. At a loss for words, the Professor pointed at the wall and simply stammered, “tha... that's... th th thatsss...”

“Huge?”

“Yes it is,” he replied, satisfied with the interposer's comment, “it's quite oh my goodness!”

Standing in front of him, at nearly two meters in length, was Director Haarvekord in all of his charms, looking neatly dressed in a pressed navy blue suit. “There's no need to question my presence Doctor Menyn,” Sarnow said to the now utterly confused and somewhat distraught scientist, “I brought you here because your nation needs you to help us solve our food crises.”

Composing himself, Piter nodded in assent to the Director's request. “I wish I could have been given some prior notification, or even a few reviews by the Central Scientific Collective before I took the trip to the capitol. The letter given to me was very vague and, to be quite honest, more than a little frightening. I known that I may not be a perfect teacher...”

Sarnow lifted his hand, “Doctor, neither I nor the government of this nation discredit your methods as an instructor of Physics, but what we are most concerned about, and the very reason I have come to greet you instead of a faceless review board, is your newest research on long distance ionic manipulation. Your research has earned some friends in very high places, and the highest among the high are me and a certain two others who are very worried about the state of Schultaria Prime's agricultural disorder. Work with us and not only will you be allowed to experiment on your theories with the deep pockets of federal merlons but you'll have the choice to head any University physics department in Schultaria Prime or elsewhere.”

Smirking for a second, Piter flatly replied, “give me a pen. We have a deal.”

HIFEX NEWS AGENCY: EDGEN, SCHULTARIA PRIME (19:45 SCT)


-Available for International Release...


Science Detachment from the Kerga Navem Meteorology Service to Depart for Extended Mission
-Updated Current Mapping and Deep Sea Exploration “Essential” Leading Government Officials Claim Despite Protests of Academic Segregation


Tomorrow at nine in the morning Schultarian Central Time a fleet of fifteen research frigates and long range freighters, under support of the Schultarian Naval Defense Forces (Kerga Navem) will depart for a three month series of meteorological observations deep within the vast expanses of the Indian Ocean. As final preparations are being made to insure and maximize the well being and operational success of the small assemblage of ships, the Kerga Navem Meteorology Service issued a series of statements stressing the international importance of this mission for all civilian shipping and coastal nations throughout the eastern Indian Ocean region. Many chief officials from the Department of Economic Affairs and interested public shipping corporations, in a collective statement concurrent with Kerga Navem's battery of press releases, lent their support calling the mission “the single largest naval scientific exercise conducted since the founding of the modern Schultarian Navy.”

Despite the emphasis placed by Kerga Navem that the mission has genuine international civilian aims, many critics of military and government scientific research lambast the cloak of exclusionary policies the Naval Defense Forces have apparently used in barring certain scientists from participating in this most recent expedition. Many preeminent scientists in the fields of Oceanography and Climatology from the University of Schultaria Prime system met with colleagues and interested citizens in an ad hoc symposium held in Colloi to address their dismay at some of the practices they call “unfair” and “elitist”. ”... (I)t's altogether dishonest to say that the Naval Defense Forces are conducting this experiment in an objective and fair manner,” noted speaker Dr. Katya Qalva, Provost of the University of Schultaria Prime-Edgen, ”the manner in which they hire and give tenure to the applicants, without fair or transparent process of selection based on their social and academic abilities, flies in the face of acceptable standards of Schultarian scientific conduct.”

”We try to insure that every researcher we approve is well qualified in their field, and is held to the rigorous standards of ethics under the Central Scientific Collective,” replied Commodore Isiah Donati, lead officer of the Kerga Navem's Office of Civilian Recruitment, 'Of course, this being a military institution, we must insure that our research must be allowed to be safe in instances where strategic implications can be gained.” When asked about the nature of the research team's future employment with Kerga Navem following the mission, the Commodore declined to comment on the scientists' security clearances or access to special governmental resources; ”Each applicant will be given a case by case review of their participation following this three month stint at sea, but that is all I can really disclose about the future careers of this team.”

Further requests for comment concerning the nature of the mission and its specific goals, including the regions where the vessels would be operating over their three month tour, could not be acquired through Hifex's repeated inquiries with the Kerga Navem Meteorology Service.

Indian Ocean: One thousand three hundred kilometers west of Edgen, Schultaria Prime

Deep within the study monolithic hull of the naval expedition's lead command vessel, the Kerga Navem Intelligence Frigate SSS Unolian, Commodore Theisel Panul nervously paced about his personal quarters. Being raised in a prestigious military family had brought the middle-aged senior officer some measure of comfort and many pleasant assignments from the offices back on the mainland, but Panul always saw ulterior motives from his superiors. Born as the third of five, his childhood was unremarkable but highly delicate as his parents never wasted a spare moment to extol the family virtues from their extensive armed forces background. Perhaps the persistence of the family myth was too great, or maybe he felt that family history alone was not enough to distinguish himself from the rest of his siblings, but more than anything the relatively spry and quick-witted gentlemen from Edgen turned into a coarse, hard-driving, taskmaster every time he boarded his personal command. Known for his style of endless daily drills and rigid scheduling, the Commodore was equally respected and derided by his crew; many within the officer and enlisted corps of the Schultarian Navy knew well of Panul's expertise and skill as an accomplished leader. They also knew that his ship had the highest transfer rate of any non-combat vessel in the fleet.

While the rest of the ship's crew carried out their daily routine with limited ceremony, the Commodore had been called by his superiors for an immediate meeting despite his persistent, yet courteous, arguments to postpone the collection of top Brass until his duty shift ended. Theisel mused silently, ”the meeting must be important, otherwise they wouldn't have called me so early in the operational day, but why couldn't they have sent me a brief or a small databurst transmission? Holoconferences are nice every once in a while, but why now?” As his thoughts drifted the officer took what time he had to clean up his personal space; and while the room he called home was far larger than the bunks of his crew, it was far smaller and spartan than his contemporary commanders in some foreign navies. Despite the smallness of the room, and even in spite of the looming meeting to take place under the thick cloak of Schultarian holography, the commander took great lengths to polish and dust every possible corner and crevice. Where most people would frequent the bottle or play cards with their shift on the lower decks, Panul found his satisfaction in methodical cleaning.

The chronometer on the Commodore's desk chimed one thirty and within the space of a scant thirty seconds the room had all but faded into the background, replaced with a nearly flawless replication of the clay-colored situation room within the confines of Schultarian Naval Command. Unlike Kerga-Navem's Combat division, very little was spared in expense to upgrade every Intel and Research vessel in the fleet with the latest in cybernetic technology, with no exceptions being applied to the upgraded holography system. While combat vessels were able to transmit the human form, nothing compared to the detail of this meeting which unnerved the normally austere commander as he tried to swat a cloud of pencil shavings floating in the simulated air.

“My apologies for taking you away from your duties Commodore,” replied a highly decorated figure only a few deceiving meters away, “however we must discuss with you the nature of your expedition... in a matter more befitting a person of your position.”

Clearing his throat, the Commodore replied somewhat nervously “I know that it is well within the rights of Kerga-Navem to withhold information to officers with less substantial rank and title, but I must also petition my right as Commander in the field to request exactly why we are talking about the mission objectives when they've already been agreed and are in effect?”

Hidden beyond the range of the holographic cameras, a somewhat tired and weathered voice wafted into being. “The mission you knew is not the one we have designed for this fleet. We will tell you what you need to know, but you must also trust that this is well within the rights of Fleet Command to alter the objectives when necessary. If the mission we design in this meeting goes successfully we'll make sure that your crew will earn rewards definitely worth the cost, and maybe even forgive your less than admirable subordinate reviews and promote you to the Admiralty.”

Flustered, but consigned to his family's legacy, Panul could only nod his head in dejected agreement.

Office of the Central Directorate: Schultaria Prime, Schultaria Prime

As the expeditionary fleet took to flank speed towards the Indian coastline at the behest of Commodore Panul, Central Director Elliot Schultz reclined blissfully in the openness of his voluminous office. Granted a small reprieve in his normally packed schedule, Elliot reclined and let himself be bombarded by the day; while his mind drifted away from the concerning matters of state, the musk of old books and the spice of his coffee wafted through the air in a powerful fusion of senses. Despite his love for the job and the publicity of his work, even after twenty-six years of triumphs and scandals under nearly twelve billion eyes, every small break was cherished when he could afford the time. The weight of the Director's schedule was unusually light for a Tuesday as several of his cabinet members and personal undersecretaries were still predisposed in the farming communities south of Tarannu, the northernmost city on Schultaria Prime's lonely island. Oh how he wished he could continue to meditate with the flow of the day, but the demands of the nation would always come first.

From Elliot's perspective, the government had every responsibility to help its citizens most directly afflicted by the fire; after all, something which had claimed so much property and nearly ruined the nation's food supply was simply too large and too devastating a force to merely resolve by the intervention of market forces and personal ingenuity. Since the day when the last acre of brush was extinguished, the Directorate had refocused its objectives on farm subsides and new methods of disrupting mother nature's “inconsistencies” in helping to nourish the state's breadbasket. Now, as Central Director Schultz finished the remainder of his coffee in silence, he thumbed page after back lit page from his datapad. Little in the report was out of the ordinary, with dozens of multicolored graphs and animations depicting weather trends and crop yields, reams of financial projection costs and farm recovery times, and endless streams of normally incomprehensible jargon dousing the pad's screen in a vibrant display of light, with the exception of a few small features concerning who composed the document.

-Farm Recovery: Strategic Interests and National Security (SECURITY CLASS O-12: DIRECTORATE)

-Composed by the Schultaria Kamor Collabraci in conjunction with the Ministry of Agriculture

One section in particular roused the Central Director from his midday malaise; the very reason his ministers were attending the scarred remains of once profitable farms and not discussing budget concerns with their Head of State.

Section Seven: The Plausibility and Effective Strategy of Using Indirect Weather Manipulation in Managing Agricultural Productivity for Foreign and Domestic Uses

Scrawled in the margins, a barely legible note was added by the Director before he left the room...

“Proof of concept... test to begin at 1025 tomorrow from Komomerenketsan platform with full satellite coverage... Notify SKC Navem expeditionary force to proceed to primary test zone with all immediate speed and prepare aid package for Indian Subcontinent residents. Chance of typhoon production anticipated at less than fifteen percent... worries abound.”

Schultarian Orbital Command Headquarters: Eldaimovey, Schultaria Prime

The sky, still unrepentant in its pre-dawn blackness, was calm and clear with a light breeze as the morning shift's motorcade arrived in single-file convoy towards the Orbital Command's mission control center. Flanked by several military escort cars bearing the Triangle Eclipse shield, the emblem of Schultaria Prime's highly trained and largely secretive Otkron Special Forces, the dozens of flight commanders and subsidiary specialists assigned for today's duties understood their work today would have consequences. What no one seemed to really know was if the Otkron were supposed to be guarding the specialists or protecting the project. Granted, those who volunteered for today's work knew the consequences could involve a major international incident if discovered in time, but there were more than a few rumors concerning suppression of those who might try to sabotage the project from the inside.

Though the Assembly and Directorate had painted the research flight merely as a private test under military jurisdiction, the Central Scientific Collective and their all-pervasive control over government research funds dictated the rules. Despite numerous appeals by the Defense Forces and interested parties within the bureaucracy, the test would be conducted under close observation to insure proper documented procedures were taking place. As the morning shift slid into their workstations, the main holographic projectors displaying every piece of knowledge of the earth available through Schultaria's immensely complex orbital network began to pour in with particular focus to the eastern coast of the nation. Meanwhile members of the Collective, clad in their familiar brown robes, filed in precession alongside the day's military escort. While many were content to mill about the periphery of the room more than a handful, some of whom were former members of the SOC, pulled up chairs with members of the mission control as companions and aides rather than inspectors.

Inside their observation lounge above the control facility, a feeling of anxiousness was growing among the government officials and military staff charged with overseeing the official proceedings of the trial run. Plenty were worried about the Collective's justifiable, but conspicuously belated, interest in the project's adherence to code, but a distinct majority were very concerned about the absence of the project's key researcher. Nearly six hundred members had presented themselves for the day's testing, but Piter Menyn was not among them.

Several kilometers removed from Orbital Command, the shy physicist had decided to pay a visit to the hangar where his years of hard work and academic criticism had come to creation. Deep within the vast structure the tremendous bulk that was the Komomerenketsan space plane glimmered in the artificial sunlight from seemingly every angle. Knowing the project's success would transform his very career, Piter had opted out of the official observation from SOC's Mission Control for a more hands on approach in insuring the mission's success. Under the din of flight crews and military mechanics inspecting for the slightest of flaws which could scrub the sturdy, but hideously complex beauty of engineering, Menyn was allowed access inside the ship's cargo bay to examine the fruits of his labor. A rather unremarkable piece of machinery from the outside, it's olive drab bomb-like appearance belied the complexity of what was to be unleashed mere in mere hours on an unsuspecting ocean, and Piter couldn't help but be nervous while inspecting his creation for the final time. As a scientist, he was venturing into new territories where the underlying mathematics of his device, let alone any experimental data, still couldn't be verified until testing. Opening every maintenance panel and probing every data port, he had to make sure every wire, joint, and processor were as secure and reliable as the government's demands specified them to be.

Thirty minutes prior to wheels up Piter left the hold smiling in triumph, heading for his destiny 10 kilometers away.

T Minus Ten Minutes to Testing

Calm seas and clear skies... the weather reports from the mainland could not have been any truer as they were relayed to the expeditionary fleet's midday briefing. With nary a cloud in the sky, many sailors had been given a brief respite from their duties below deck to take in some sun and unwind from the drudgery of military routine. On the deck of every one of the fifteen ships, dozens of officers and enlisted packed the decks to take in the day's bounty; and while some were more than content just to enjoy their work under less cramped conditions, everyone was hard pressed to find anything to gripe while steaming northward in the warm Equatorial waters.

After ten weeks of mapping currents and charting endless square kilometers of ocean floor, the Naval Department's mission objectives were nearly four days ahead of schedule much to the fleet's relief. Duly impressed by the tenacity of his crew and the competence of his officers in speedily completing their work, Commodore Panul requested from the mainland to retire to port early as reward for their efforts, if not an outright admission that his crew deserved a rest from his grating scheduling from the previous two months. What he received wasn't an early ride home, but certainly a welcomed change in the ordinary routine for the expedition...

"Complete final Oceanic Mapping in southern quarter of the Carlsberg Ridge region with conventional SONAR probing; consider primary and secondary missions complete when all data has been collected. Once mission has been completed, extended one week shore leave for the Indian subcontinent has been granted, if commander so chooses to engage at personal discretion, prior to safe harbor return in Edgen."

-SKC NAVEM CENTOM

As the frigates approached their last major survey region, the cloudless sky concealed the gigantic Komomerenketsan while it drifted in silent orbit two hundred kilometers above the flat sea. Drifting in the blissful free fall of low planetary orbit, the spaceplane's six person crew took shifts between enjoying the wonders of flight and surveying the mission site for any suspicious weather changes or foreign shadows chasing the research fleet. Though the news media had been covering the discussion between government and concerned citizens over the theory of artificial climate change and the nation's capacity to research and develop a prototype device in the near future, virtually no one knew just how far ahead the state was to the media's projections. Where news experts and traditional political analysts armed with quite reliable knowledge of the state's efficiency had claimed nearly two years from “concept to can”, Piter had completed his first large scale device in less than eight months.

Within less than a handful of minutes, the science team in Schultarian Orbital Command would either see Menyn's triumph, or the end of his career.

Approaching target orbit with ease, the crew of the spaceplane aligned themselves towards India with only several thousand kilometers between them and their quarry, an insignificant patch of ocean known simply as Impact Alpha. Underneath the crew cabin, the cargo hold's gaping maw retracted to expose Schultaria's newest scientific power. Barely four meters in length and a meter in diameter, the cigar-shaped device with its tangle of wires and small openings looked little more than a madman's dream or a fool's odyssey, but deep within its circuitry lay technology the likes of which would have made a visionary like Di Vinci or Edison intimidated at its brutal boldness. All the craft's crew had to do was guide the aiming reticle to its patch of ocean some three hundred kilometers southwest of the fleet. Mission control, and its government escort, would do the rest.

HIFEX NEWS AGENCY: EDGEN, SCHULTARIA PRIME (12:03 SCT)


-Available for International Release...


International Weather Report:
North / North-Central Indian Ocean Region
[28 Nal'ptava (November)]

At approximately 11:45 Schultarian Standard Time, a moderate-sized cloudburst with storm potential was detected via SKC Navem's Meteorology Service headquarters in Edgen, Schultaria Prime some two thousand five hundred kilometers south-southwest of Mumbai, India. Unexpectedly warm northern equatorial waters, combined with a cold front not previously detected by predictive satellite modeling, have been identified as generating this recent event according to the SKC-NMC.

On-site observations of the cloudburst provided by Schultarian naval vessels some 50 kilometers north of the weather event have noted an increase in sea swell height by .5 meters and occasional gusts approaching 150 km/h. Current estimations predict that this cloudburst will disperse due to a lack of consistent cold front activity within the next twenty four to thirty six hours, provided by the climatologic data of the on-site fleet. While such weather events normally produce monsoon-like events between the months of Yect'kithpa (July) and Aseleim (September), the average surface temperature of the ocean for this time of the year holds little additional thermal potential to provide the storm with enough latent energy for a full monsoon. Although not anticipated to reach land with any force, save for a few small showers across the southern quarter of the Indian subcontinent, any vessels operating within the Southern Arabian Sea or near the Maldives should either anticipate choppy seas or hold in harbor until the event subsides.

Further updates on this event will be provided as data becomes available.

OOC: If anyone wants to participate in this event, or at least IC'ly TAG the thread but hasn't felt capable of doing so before this time, hopefully this small blurb will provide enough to raise some national interest.

OOC: As much as I hate to do this to the thread, I'm going to BUMP it on the off-chance that there are nations who would like to participate. I'd seriously hate for this to drop off active role-play, but only so much can be done by me before it feels as though I'm just writing to myself. As much as I enjoy the creative process, I’d certainly enjoy it more with equally interested storytellers.

OOC: Just found this thread - since we had a minor part in the agricultural crisis RP, could we participate in someway, possibly by sending a Laison, or some observers?

Haven't seen you on NS for a little while, so it's good to be RPing with you again dude :)

We of the Ecotechnics Institute of the United Arcologies of Commonalitarianism wish to contact you about helping solve some of your immediate problems with food shortages. We specializing in uniting science with ecology to solve environmental and industrial problems. We suggest you might consider as a stop gap measure introdicing vertical farms for your urban population centers.

We currently have available multistory integrated organic farms based on a closed ecological loop model. These farms are both sustainable and offer long term economic benefits. Vertical farms offer year round crop production, organic production, and environmental benefits. We would offer to build such farms in any run down section of your section which needs urban renewal. We would be willing to buy abandoned properties in your cities and convert them into skyscraper farms. The building designs of the farms include solar glass, built in wind generators in the facades, and solar roofing panels.

We would also be willing to build bioshelter sewage treatment plants to produce fertilizer for the farms as well as methane to help power them.

OOC: Here is a link if you are interested http://www.verticalfarm.com

Regards,

Mimi Ohyes, Director Ecotechnic Institute, PPC-- Public Private Consortium

Combined Manhattan Intelligence (CMI) Central HQ, Manhattan

It was just another boring day of checking weather reports for low ranking CMI analyst Karl Ramunsen, but this one was proving to be a bit different; something odd had just come in from climate monitoring systems – a storm of unusual nature in the Indian Ocean.

Ramunsen was far from an expert, but he knew that storms were created when a center of low pressure developed, surrounded by a region of high pressure. The opposing forces create winds and result in the formation of storm clouds. Storms were common in the region, but this one still seemed odd somehow – Ramunsen couldn’t quite put his finger on it, it just felt unusual. The waters in the Northern Indian Ocean shouldn’t be warm enough at this time of year, and where the hell had that cold front come from? He’d been monitoring the Northern part of the Indian Ocean for months, and had come to learn something of its nature – and there had been no sign of any cold front in that sector yesturday. It was like it had just appeared from nowhere, and so quickly too…

“Time to go to work” he thought, cross-referencing with foreign climate satellites in the region, and quickly finding a report from Edgen, Schultaria Prime that confirmed his findings – they hadn’t picked up on that mysterious cold front before today either, but felt that the storm would quickly disperse, and cause little if any damage – Ramunsen wasn’t so sure, he had a very bad feeling about this, and couldn’t explain it. He re-read one line that had been bothering him; ‘Current estimations predict that this cloudburst will disperse due to a lack of consistent cold front activity within the next twenty four to thirty six hours’. There had been a lack of cold front activity just yesterday, but that hadn’t prevented this strange weather from arising – what would happen if more mysterious cold fronts arose, and the storm didn’t just fade out? Saving the information on the report, Ramunsen thought he had better let his boss know at the very least, so Manhattanite vessels could be warned.

His boss, Deputy Director Anderson, was quick in arriving in Ramunsen’s office, and listened intently to the analyst’s report.

“Do we have any vessels in the area?” he asked.

Ramunsen called up the appropriate screen, scanning for Manhattanite transponder codes within 1000 miles of the reported storm. “Three Sir”, he replied “although only this one is close enough to be in danger of feeling the affects of the storm.” With another glance at his console he continued: “Here, erm, the MNS Serenity, Holland Class destroyer”.

“Good work Ramunsen – you and Smith keep a close eye on that storm, I want to know any changes, no matter how small. I’ll issue a warning to the Serenity – at present it seems best if she just weights anchor and tries to wait the storm out, but if it gets any worse, then I need to know immediately, understand?” Anderson ordered.

“Yes Sir, I’ll keep on it”

OOC: Apologies for any scientifical SNAFU’s – like Ramunsen, I’m no expert on storms.

*TAG* I'm sure I can get involved in some way.

S.S. Anne-Passanger/Cargo Ship

The ship was sailing under clear skies and calm waters but a storm came out of nowhere. Captian Azumi Kurosawa a veteran Kuronan Sailor was taken by suprise, being knocked out of bed she quickly threw on her rain coat over her drawrs and went above to the Bridge. "What on earth, the sky was clear this early morning, not a sign of a storm what is going on?"

"We aren't sure ma'am. Apparently a cloud burst."

"This isn't Xanadou, there's no reason there should be a sudden storm with no warning, and nothing on the charts."

"It's pretty rough Captian."

"Too rough, we haven't had any pre-storm prep on the ship yet."

"We may have to dock up and wait it out if it get's any rougher."

"Just remember we have $40,000 of goods and 2200 people aboard we have no room for error on any part."

She took the wheel and began the navigation through the stormy seas.

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