3208: SNEWS

SNEWS

|< < Prev #3208 (February 16, 2026)

Title text: People say setting of fireworks indoors is dangerous, but I looked at their energy release and it's like 10^-40 foe; totally negligible.

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Explanation

Ponytail is showing Hairy her bedroom. Hairy asks about the large device on the ceiling, and Ponytail explains that it is part of the SNEWS (SuperNova Early Warning System). This detects neutrinos (massless particles that travel at the speed of light, rarely interacting with matter) to give pre-notice of supernovae, as neutrinos are produced in large quantities during the collapse of the star core, hours before the main photon production. She explains this gives astronomers warning, allowing them to observe the event with telescopes and other instruments.

Hairy then asks regarding the nature of the visible equipment mounted on the ceiling, which has several protruding barrels. His first assumption is that it is either detector as part of the SNEWS, or some kind of telescope to be used in the event the SNEWS goes off. Ponytail explains that the device it is in fact a fireworks launcher, for the purposes of waking her up so she can witness the supernova herself. This is a very bad idea for a multitude of reasons. Reckless usage of fireworks is already known for causing significant property damage and personal injury even when used outdoors; launching fireworks inside the house means causing an explosion in a controlled area, guaranteeing that it will hit the building, maximizing the opportunity for the conflagration to ignite something flammable on the structure, and containing and therefore amplifying the sound of the burst (which can already deafen people who are too close).

Understandably, Hairy leaves to sleep at his own house.

The title text is a play on the tremendous amount of energy released by a supernova. The foe is an esoteric unit equal to 10^44 Joule, on the order of the amount of energy released by a supernova. In comparison, human-scale amounts of energy — even relatively significant ones such as firework detonations — are negligible. This ignores the fact that energy releases that are "negligible in comparison to a supernova" can still be easily fatal to humans.

Transcript

This is one of 45 incomplete transcripts: Don't remove this notice too soon. If you can fix this issue, edit the page!

[Ponytail is walking into her room. The room has a bed, a set of drawers and a large sci-fi device mounted on the ceiling. Hairy is standing in the room, pointing up at the device.]

Hairy: What's that device?

Ponytail: Part of the supernova early warning system.

Ponytail: There hasn't been a Milky Way supernova in over a century.

Ponytail: Astronomers don't want to miss the next one.

[Close up of Ponytail, now sitting on the end of the bed]

Ponytail: 20 years ago, we set up a supernova alert system using neutrino detectors.

Ponytail: It should give us a few hours' advance notice.

[In a frame-less panel the view zooms back out, showing Ponytail and Hairy.]

Ponytail: If it ever goes off, every astronomer on earth will scramble to point their equipment at the sky.

Hairy: Oh, OK. So is that a detector? Or some kind of telescope?

[The panel moves to the right, showing Hairy walking away. Ponytail is still on the end of the bed, raising a clenched fist for dramatic effect.]

Ponytail: Fireworks launcher.

Ponytail: I refuse to sleep through a supernova.

Hairy: I think I'll spend the night at my place instead.

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Discussion

The title text SNEWS is a reference to SuperNova_Early_Warning_System. 2a09:bac2:3656:ebe::178:123 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~) 21:58, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

No, you're wrong. It stands for Southeast, North East West South, since those are the directions where it can detect them. - 45.178.1.151 01:41, 17 February 2026 (UTC)

F1RST! also i posted this when there was no explanation. please fix this 2605:59c8:22e3:3e14:95a1:c5da:4c49:c384 (talk) 22:55, 16 February 2026 (UTC) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Is this my mediocre non-native English, or should the title text read "setting off fireworks indoors"? (Trivia?) --2001:A62:5F7:FB01:538E:3F07:C9F0:F0C0 23:06, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, 'setting of fireworks indoors, ...' would mean setting them up (i.e., placing them) and not 'setting off', lighting or detonating the fireworks. Sameldacamel34 (talk) 23:22, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

You can talk of setting explosives (the setting of them, as passively ready, to make them ready for later "setting them off"), so I expect the "setting of fireworks" is pretty much the same thing, much as with the setting of an alarm clock.

Though also sounds like a possible americanism, like "lit it on fire" (c.f. my own prefered "set light to it"), if only because the former seem tautilogical; and/or strangely long-winded, such as with "to burglarize" vs. just "to burgle" (both being what a burglar does upon his burglary). But it's not one of those many funny transatlantic dialect things I've noticed previously, so I could be overexplaining what actually is merely a typo. 82.132.239.3 01:33, 17 February 2026 (UTC)

It snew Yaokuan ITB (talk) 23:28, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

Exactly my thoughts, Yaokuan 216.25.182.141 23:58, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

Gesundheit! Logalex8369 (talk) 01:35, 17 February 2026 (UTC)

Sorry, it somehow escaped me when editing the explanation that neutrinos have mass!! (even though we've known about this for decades). Does this mean that if the supernova is far away enough, the photons will arrive before the neutrinos? Or is that threshold too far to matter? Sameldacamel34 (talk) 01:21, 17 February 2026 (UTC)

my first edit in almost 5 months i think lol P?sych??otic?pot??at???o (talk) 01:45, 17 February 2026 (UTC)
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