Spaceflight, Starships and Structure of the Universe

[GuerrierCosmique 147]

Do they have any kinds of space travel Equestria? It's obvious they know about outer space, because Canterlot has an observatorium while Nightmare Moon has been on the moon, but what about rockets, space shuttles and starships? I assume Nightmare Moon travelled to and from the moon by being transformed into some sort of energy to cross the void between the Moon and Equestrian world or teleportation?

 

Luna Eclipsed features a pony wearing an astronaut-like costume, this means the ponies have some sort of vessel-based space travel or at least know about the concept, too.

 

According to Issue #4 of the comic series, Equestria's planet is a spherical body with one moon circling around it. This moon is habitable and inhabited, with breathable atmosphere, plantlife and some sort of non-organic pony beings. In "Art of the Dress (song)", Twilight mentions Orion, Canis Major and Minor, wth actual pictures shown, zodiac singns visible from the Solar System only. No guess what this means. Why do Celestia and Luna have move Sun and Moon?

 

I assume there is some sort of primitive spaceflight technology in Equestria, too, because of the observatorium to watch the stars and the pony's costume at Luna's party. Rockets are a possibilty or a catapult accelerating Pegasi to shot them into outer space. Twilight Sparkle is able to teleport herself with no time passing, it could be used to cross the empty space between star systems at speeds faster than light.

 

 

 

 

[MyLittlePonyTales 273]

Well, in case people haven't read comic #6, I'll put a spoiler tag. Before reading the comic, I would have just put the pony in the space helmet as an animation goof. I don't think the people working on the show always take into account that Equestria does not have the same tech level as Earth. Now, as for the comic,

 

 

Celestia, Luna, and the main six pulled the moon closer to Equestria and then traveled to it. So that means that either ponies do not breath, do not breath oxygen, or there is oxygen on Equestrias moon. Seriously, they just fly there and then are walking around on the moon. So, if you consider the comics canon, space travel is definitely possible.

 

[Colt 555]

Well, in case people haven't read comic #6, I'll put a spoiler tag. Before reading the comic, I would have just put the pony in the space helmet as an animation goof. I don't think the people working on the show always take into account that Equestria does not have the same tech level as Earth. Now, as for the comic,

 

 

Celestia, Luna, and the main six pulled the moon closer to Equestria and then traveled to it. So that means that either ponies do not breath, do not breath oxygen, or there is oxygen on Equestrias moon. Seriously, they just fly there and then are walking around on the moon. So, if you consider the comics canon, space travel is definitely possible.

 

 

 

BUT an this is a big one so wait

 

BUT

 

Yeah thats right. If they had to "drag" the moon closer that how closer it was? This is important why well. The earth atmosphere as we all know its 420 km and all around the moon its about 1/4 of everything earth is, mass, volume damn even escape speed its close to 1/4. So that would give the approximately height to its atmosphere of 105km. 

 

Also the show has proven in multiple situations by breath holding and even musical instruments that there is an atmosphere in the world that hosts Equestria so we must assume the moon has its own compatible atmosphere too.

 

SO if Celestia an Luna were able to approach the moon to something close of 500km that travel would have been a "interatmospheric flight"( i just made up a word) and within that distance the gravity of both cosmic bodies could have even counter each other giving the ponies the means to break the escape velocity of their home-world.

 

Of course this seems out of place as the real distance beteen the earth and the moon is 3.8 X10^5 km and the consequences of brining a moon that close to its world would end in a global catastrophe of apocalyptic degree. But hey this are talking horses than can move worlds and stars with their magic so...

 

LETS JUST SAY MAGIC EXPLAINS ALL!!!! and space travel can be achieved by the arcane mysteries of the obscure arts

 

But thats just a theory A PONY THEORY thanks for reading

 

 

[long gone 8,929]

Damn you Colt, I was gonna make the Pony Theory joke Oh well, I'll do it anyway as I present my own theory.

 

 

 

Although Equestria has an observatory, I'd doubt that they know how to build a spaceworthy craft. Their technology is only oh so advanced. I can remember reading that the writers wanted to keep it mostly like the medieval times in which technology was very primitive, while mixing in more modern stuff from time to time. Therefore, while an industrial hairdryer can exist (as a joke), a spacecraft the scale of the Apollo line or Saturn V cannot as those are probably too advanced for the world Faust created. Also, as I said, I'd doubt they would really know much about building and launching spaceworthy vehicles. Also, I'd probably make an educated guess that the amount of Delta-V required to leave the MLP world's atmosphere is similar to Earth, but physics in MLP do not work the same as they do in real life and therefore gravity could be completely different, affecting the amount of Delta-V required to reach low orbit and the calculations required to determine the amount of Delta-V needed for the vehicle to both escape the atmosphere and make it to its destination, with enough Delta-V to return to Equestria, which would mean a whole lot more complicated vehicle than Apollo or Saturn V would be required. Further, I'd doubt that Canterlot would be so willing to dump billions upon billions of bits into research for something, even if it's for a major contribution to science, especially if it's all for naught and the rocket pulls a Kerbal Space Program on the launchpad and explodes upon ignition or there's this spectacularly destructive staging error that was not detected until the very last second and the SRBs fly off without the rocket, possibly crashing into spectators and leading to death and serious injury among the Equestrian people. That would be taxpayer money going to waste in a dangerous and destructive way, and would not sit well with the Equestrian taxpayer.

 

But of course, this is also just a theory - A PONY theory! Thanks for reading.

 

Edited July 30, 2013 by Daring

[Zygen 6,066]

I assume they have some basic knowledge from what they can see from equestria, and i'm gonna guess that Luna atleast and maybe Celestia can go to the moon somehow, however I think besides that there are no space crafts or anything, i mean they don't even have alot of modern technology, I doubt they'd have space ships.

 

Just my thoughts.

[Fluttershutter 3,382]

The spacepony on Nightmare Night doesn't prove that they have space travel. On earth Jules Verne wrote about space travel long before it was a reality. It would be cool if Twilight built some kind of steampunk space ship and they all went to space.

 

I've wondered exactly what Celectia and Luna do to the sun and moon. There's really no clear answer.

[RrVPfX9cPtw59FpC 1,304]

Well, what's the maximum height for a pegasus pony? I suppose the atmosphere might prevent them from going into outer space, but for an alicorn, they could fly and cast a spell protecting themselves. I bet at least one princess has done it.

[Scootalove 10,692]

I guess Equestria knows about Orion, Ursa Major, Ursa Minor, but they weren't able to see them. Their solar system has stars, but they are only able to see the Sun and Moon but not other planets. Even, for a fictional universe they have knowledge about astronomy.