Survivor communities outside the known world

[BarbaryLion22]

Also:
"nui" = "great, large" is one of the few Hawaiian words I know.  What is a "mo'o nui"?

Sorry it took so long for me to answer this, I only just checked today. Mo'o is lizard, and a Mo'o nui is a mythical being that plays a lot of roles in Hawaiian mythology, usually as an antagonist (it literally means big/large lizard). For some reason, the phrase "lizard woman" comes to mind, though I have no idea where it came from. I suspect the story of Hi'iaka.

[KMK]

I really don't know whether or not the UK could impose martial law quickly and decisively or not. My guess is they'd try and lock down the ports and airports and the channel tunnel pretty quickly but nationwide martial law might indeed be slow to be implemented. What I'm more concerned with is that such an act would be utterly meaningless when the rash can be transmitted via any mammal (or so it seems). Martial law can keep people from moving around the country, but all it would take is one infected rat or dog or something like that to slip out and that's that.

All you have to know about what would happen in Britain is to go back 12 or so years and look at all the news reports about the Foot and Mouth disease that was rampaging England under Tony Blair. The people who were supposed to be helping were slaughtering the animals and then driving the lorries full of their dead infected bodies away dripping blood down the streets! And it is not even a LETHAL DISEASE! Just a very economically inconvenient one! People lost herds and flocks of 500 years of genetics. The Prince himself intervened and got it approved that if someone set up their barn with plastic tenting and strict quarantine that they wouldn't have to automatically slaughter their flock/heard because the farm next door had an outbreak. It was a total fiasco.

[KMK]

In all seriousness, I do agree with this. Lots of good points raised that I didn't think of. On top of all that, too, it would be nearly impossible to retake land without very cold winters, assuming that extreme heat isn't enough to actually kill trolls. They would have to manually hunt down every single beast, troll and giant.

Since the only information we have so far points to trolls thriving in heat, I think the base assumption should be that extreme heat wouldn't be as big a concern to trolls as cold. It's true that, no matter what you are, enough heat will kill you. However, given that we don't actually know their limit and that we do know that they prefer hotter environments, I really think we have to assume that they have a very high tolerance for heat.

As for humidity, I don't think we really have anything to go on one way or the other. The starting assumption kinda has to be that it wouldn't really affect them, at least until some more information comes up.

It is not the heat but the ultraviolet that would kill the trolls.

[Nefelpitou]

Just wanted to make some notes

Which makes sense.  Because the disease is, as we've noted, basically a total wipeout.  We would know very easily if Iceland had suffered a substantial infection -- because the Y90 population would be in the 100s, top.

Actually, the strongest evidence of your argument is the immunity rates - nearly half of all people in Scandinavia in y90 are immune. 48% of the population. In Iceland, it's 7%.

Those lacking immunity survived in Iceland and died in other places.

If you go back and read the prelude, the difference was two days.  Two days, at most, between when the government in Reykjavík made the decision to impose absolute quarantine on the island (combined, presumably, with quarantine on all visitors who had arrived recently), and when the other governments of the world began following suit.

<SNIP> 

By day 3 Denmark closes its borders, but it doesn't help.  Denmark is already dead.  The people on the ferry boat were by some freak coincidence a whisker ahead of the rash.

This is a lethal freaking disease.  Virulent, incredibly infectious, and incredibly lethal.

Denmark is also connected to other countries via land. Wild mammals or people getting past borders (easier on land) would get through regardless.
It doesn't matter when Denmark closed borders. It could have closed them before Iceland - it was doomed anyway.

It's borders closing and the storm were important help (especially once things got out of control and people tried to migrate away from disaster zones), but Iceland's saving grace was that it is girt by sea. Infected mammals were far less likely to ever reach the island.

I'm not sure about that, the southern US states seem to cope with it quite well (I kid ).  But in all seriousness, I think people from different settlements would group together instinctively and that would probably provide enough diversity for a century or so.  As I have said before, modern day Iceland is notoriously inbred and yet they are (kinda) thriving in Year 90.

BTW, loving your avatar

Thanks

and I suppose you have a point. Genetic diversity wouldn't be too severe of an issue for quite a while

I mean look at cheetahs - they're practically clones of one another.

[princeofdoom]

It is not the heat but the ultraviolet that would kill the trolls.

I don't think it's either. Apparently moonlight can hinder trolls as well as sunlight. Now the moon only reflects the light the sun gives off, and mostly in the visual spectrum. Little or no UV gets reflected, and the little that did would be defused by the atmosphere. It also doesn't give off heat. So, I think it's the actual light from the sun or moon. This may be a magical thing, since both are seen as deities in most cultures. Does man-made light stop trolls is the question.

[BrainBlow]

In areas of extreme heat I imagine most trolls, if they don't outright thrive in it, will simply live on the coastlines and the rivers.
And since most of the population in extremely warm countries already live along the rivers and the coasts, it wouldn't make much of a difference.
The Tigris–Euphrates river system have kept life flourishing in Mesopotamia for thousands of years, but in the SSSS universe they would now also most likely keep trolls alive.

[BreezeLouise]

It is not the heat but the ultraviolet that would kill the trolls.

I don't think it's either. Apparently moonlight can hinder trolls as well as sunlight. Now the moon only reflects the light the sun gives off, and mostly in the visual spectrum. Little or no UV gets reflected, and the little that did would be defused by the atmosphere. It also doesn't give off heat. So, I think it's the actual light from the sun or moon. This may be a magical thing, since both are seen as deities in most cultures. Does man-made light stop trolls is the question.

That's an interesting thought. I hadn't really thought about why the moon discourages trolls as well as the sunlight. It could be that ultraviolet does kill trolls, which leads them to be conditioned to avoiding light. While the moonlight wouldn't kill them, it could still be a deterrent. If that's the case, then man-made light should work as a deterrent as well, since they're just avoiding light in general. They might be able to differentiate between natural and unnatural light, though, so I can't really say for sure.

On the other hand, if it's some kind of magical property of the sun and moon, then we don't know that they have a conditioned (or instinctual) avoidance of light in general. Man-made light may work, but it also might not. What's interesting to me, though, is that trolls are able to survive in moonlight. On the train ride, the threat level was lowered, but only to a 7/10. That implies that the moon would either be a lot weaker than the sun, or that it's not diametrically opposed to trolls.

As for UV killing trolls...they would survive that just as easily in a hot climate as they would anywhere else in the world. That seems kinda irrelevant to me.

If you're an aircraft carrier and you had personnel transfer in the 48 hours between day 0 and day 3?  All dead.  Floating tomb.

Remote, sparsely inhabited island with a bed and breakfast for tourists?  All dead.  Or trolls.

So from the point of view of imagining intact societies, we're faced with an interesting situation.  In some ways it simplifies things.  It doesn't really matter so much who has what equipment or training, or which kinds of geographies help or hinder human survival.  It all really boils down to one thing:  were you cut off from the rest of the world by day 0 or weren't you?

On the issue of aircraft carriers, I disagree. By day 0, people were presenting with symptoms and everyone knew it was a bad disease--they didn't think it was lethal, but they knew it was highly contagious. They knew enough for Iceland to close its borders. Nobody in their right mind would risk an aircraft carrier being out of commission for two weeks (which was the number used in the comic, IIRC). I have no doubt that, if they absolutely needed a personnel change, there would be a rigorous screening process beforehand. The Rash is dangerous and highly contagious, but not invisible. Maybe this wouldn't work for all 10 of the aircraft carriers, but I find it pretty easy to believe that the majority would be able to make it.

As for the small island with the bed and breakfast? That depends on a few things. If it's an extremely popular tourist destination, then yeah, it's pretty much done for. If it's a smaller place that happens to get a few tourists now and then, though, I think it's got a fighting chance. You're assuming that just about everybody were carriers by day 0, which I think is almost certainly wrong. Aino and Kaino came directly from a city (a train station, no less) on day 5, and they were both fine. If a few people visit a small, remote island after day 0, I think there's a fair chance that they wouldn't be sick. The closer to day 0 it is, the more likely they're not carriers; the farther from day 0 it is, the more likely they are to cut off travel. You are right, though, that if even one of them is sick, the whole island is done for. It's definitely far from certain that they'd survive, but I'd give them a much better chance than "All dead. Or trolls."

For, say, entire countries, I agree. if you're not closed off by day 0, then there's not much hope. For remote islands, though, I think it's safe to be a lot more lenient.

[Amity]

Maybe this wouldn't work for all 10 of the aircraft carriers, but I find it pretty easy to believe that the majority would be able to make it.

Well, that's why I think it depends on whether they had new people coming aboard.  I don't actually know -- how often do personnel rotate on blue water surface ships?  And how "trigger-happy" are the quarantine policies in case of an epidemic?  That makes all the difference.

It's also why I think the best bet is the nuclear submarines.  By the same reasoning, they are conversely almost guaranteed to be un-affected -- and while their power plants aren't as apocalypse-proof as geothermal energy, they are enough to last through the worst decades of the rash crisis.

Those nuclear warheads might even be retroconverted into fast reactor fuel.. I could see the remnants of the US Navy spending decades trying to get that working.  Finally put those weapons to good use!

[BreezeLouise]

Well, that's why I think it depends on whether they had new people coming aboard.  I don't actually know -- how often do personnel rotate on blue water surface ships?  And how "trigger-happy" are the quarantine policies in case of an epidemic?  That makes all the difference.

It's also why I think the best bet is the nuclear submarines.  By the same reasoning, they are conversely almost guaranteed to be un-affected -- and while their power plants aren't as apocalypse-proof as geothermal energy, they are enough to last through the worst decades of the rash crisis.

Those nuclear warheads might even be retroconverted into fast reactor fuel.. I could see the remnants of the US Navy spending decades trying to get that working.  Finally put those weapons to good use!

I'm not sure either, but let's put it this way. Things were bad enough that Iceland closed its borders. I think at that point, any halfway intelligent commander would err on the side of caution. Aircraft carriers are arguably our military's most important asset, to let a disease take one out of commission would be disastrous--especially for the career of whoever made that call. That wouldn't /actually/ matter, obviously, but they would think it did. There's also those carriers that are already at sea. If any of them happen to be at sea during the first half week, which seems likely to me, it's pretty certain that they will survive.
Edit: This article (https://http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB9316/index1.html) seems to say that personnel are swapped out every 32 months, unless I'm misunderstanding. Okay, I knew that seemed ridiculous. 6-8 or 10.5 (confusing acronyms wut) months of deployment, during which the crew stays the same. (http://fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ship/cv.htm) (http://tinyurl.com/ozsx76r). U.S. nuclear submarines actually have two different crews which alternate every 3 months or less. (http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/10-31-navy.pdf)
Other edit: Right now, policy dictates that three to four carrier strike groups are deployed at one time. This will supposedly be cut down to two in the near future. Also, one CSG is based out of Yokosuka Naval Base in Japan, meaning if Japan makes it, they make it. However, Yokosuka is located pretty close to Tokyo in Honshu, which is the largest island and presumably least likely to survive.
So much research. x_x

That is true. Nuclear submarine reactors last quite a bit longer than carrier ones too, if I'm remembering that right. They wouldn't be able to save as many people as aircraft carriers, since they're only crewed by a couple hundred people each instead of several thousand, but they would probably be safer. Until it's time to get food, that is--I think carriers would have the advantage there, even if just from sheer force of numbers.

The fuel thing's been addressed, too, unfortunately. I was thinking something along the same lines at first, but the reactors aren't actually refueled, they're replaced. They would have to build entirely new reactors. Personally, I can't really see that happening. The only hope I can see for that is the people that work on the carriers/submarines that operate and maintain the reactors. If they have enough knowledge about the reactors (which seems pretty unlikely to me, honestly), they could try to build a new one. That would, however, still leave the problem of having to find any materials that they weren't able to re-use, which could range from very hard to pretty much impossible.
This post is a mess I'm sorry. ;~;

[urbicande]

If they have enough knowledge about the reactors (which seems pretty unlikely to me, honestly), they could try to build a new one.

I can't see that happening. There's a WHOLE lot of infrastructure that goes into building and maintaining these things. There certainly aren't going to be any in Y90.  They'd undoubtedly hold out for a while, but then they'd need to just come  in to port somewhere.

[BreezeLouise]

I can't see that happening. There's a WHOLE lot of infrastructure that goes into building and maintaining these things. There certainly aren't going to be any in Y90.  They'd undoubtedly hold out for a while, but then they'd need to just come  in to port somewhere.

Right, agreed. That's pretty much what I was trying to say in the sentence immediately after that one. They would, however, ride out the worst of the storm in safety. They also might not necessarily need to find a proper port, in theory they could find a nice, defensible location and beach the thing. They'd have a ready-made fortress and a massive supply of free scrap metal, electrical components, stuff like that.

[urbicande]

Right, agreed. That's pretty much what I was trying to say in the sentence immediately after that one. They would, however, ride out the worst of the storm in safety. They also might not necessarily need to find a proper port, in theory they could find a nice, defensible location and beach the thing. They'd have a ready-made fortress and a massive supply of free scrap metal, electrical components, stuff like that.

Certainly a possibility.  I don't know if one CAN really beach a sub, but I've never tried.

[BarbaryLion22]

On the other hand, if it's some kind of magical property of the sun and moon, then we don't know that they have a conditioned (or instinctual) avoidance of light in general. Man-made light may work, but it also might not. What's interesting to me, though, is that trolls are able to survive in moonlight. On the train ride, the threat level was lowered, but only to a 7/10. That implies that the moon would either be a lot weaker than the sun, or that it's not diametrically opposed to trolls.

What you said about the moon not being as opposed to trolls, it reminded me of the yin and yang philosophy. What I remember is that yin can represent the moon, but also darkness, chaos, and spirit-y stuff (wikipedia said the netherworld). That seems right up troll alley, at least to me. So maybe the moon's light doesn't hurt the trolls as much, because they have the same affiliation?

As for the extreme heat, I'm pretty sure deserts are some of the most sterile places in the world. (Don't quote me. One of Paul Salopek's dispatches from about a year ago was my reference) The Arab desert has all those wells made by the Nabataeans, right? Could they be used as a viable resource for 90 years?

[urbicande]

As for the extreme heat, I'm pretty sure deserts are some of the most sterile places in the world. (Don't quote me. One of Paul Salopek's dispatches from about a year ago was my reference) The Arab desert has all those wells made by the Nabataeans, right? Could they be used as a viable resource for 90 years?

There are plenty of large mammals in the Sahara.  Fewer than in easier environments, but life is pretty tenacious.

It's a good thing that spiders can't become beasts or we'd be in trouble.

[snotra]

I went to one of the Wadden islands this weekend. I mentioned these islands off the coast of the Netherlands, Germany and Denmark a few times. The island I visited was in line of sight of the mainland, the ferry is scheduled for every two or-so hours with a high speed water taxi, a helicopter landing pad and a yacht harbour as a separated facility. Considering most islands have similar amenities, they're done for as a whole, lest there was an immediate total shutdown on day 0 or 1. Cosidering all the tourist traffic, they'll be having a food crisis in a few weeks time, after which the population might be able to live off the arable land and whatever washes ashore, along with the surviving fishing industry. They'd need to rebuild coastal defences from scratch, though. Anything remotely resembling a firearm has been welded shut to protect tourists from harpooning themselves.
Then there's the problem of large numbers of seals active in the region. They're all potential beasts.