(urth) Shape of the Whorl

[Jeff Wilson]

Matthew Keeley wrote:
> On Wed, Jan 21, 2009 at 7:03 PM, Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com> wrote:
>> To take this even further, if it's oblong, valley shadows might be more probable since the Long Sun wouldn't always be *directly* overhead, but at more of an angle. (Assuming, of course, that the interior curves along both axes...but I get the feeling that I'm starting to think too much.)
>>
>> Craig
> 
> I think it would look more or less cylindrical from the inside; the
> various bumps and protrusions on the outside of the asteroid might be
> hollowed out as well, but they might house parts of the Whorl's
> "plumbing" - the reservoirs mentioned in the text, clone storage, etc.
> You could also use some irregularities in the hollowed Whorl to create
> valleys and lakes I suppose.

Spin gravity would require all the local upward directions to point 
inward to the same axis where the long sun is to be found, preventing 
shadows of any appreciable size to be cast across valleys during the 
unshaded day. However, during the shaded night, those valleys would be 
lit from off-vertical overhead angles by their skylands, with lighter 
colors structures or ripened crops being brighter, and the closer (and 
therefore least vertical) longitudes being brighter as well.

This would allow a valley at Longitude 0° to be lit by 40 acres of flax 
at Long 45° of the same latitude as if by a rising moon, with lots of 
shadows to conceal skullduggery, but still enough ambient light to 
facilitate it.

-- 
Jeff Wilson - jwilson at io.com
< http://www.io.com/~jwilson >