Editing 2559: December 25th Launch
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According to the title text, the {{w|range safety officer}} has made the decision to shoot down Santa Claus's sleigh, in order to clear the sky above, protecting the launch window. This seems to demonstrate that they are determined not to let anything delay the launch any further (or that given a choice between destroying the telescope or destroying Santa, the range safety officer chooses the latter). "Range Safety Officer" is the job title of a person in charge of the safety of a launch. Range safety officer and other similar range officers are the subject of [[2876: Range Safety]]. That was the first comic after New Years day in 2024, so seems like Randall contemplated rocket launches around the Holidays... Also earlier in the Christmas comic of 2023 he also killed Santa using [[Hydrothermal Vents]]. Before this he has only killed Santa back in 2008 in the [[2008 Christmas Special]]. | According to the title text, the {{w|range safety officer}} has made the decision to shoot down Santa Claus's sleigh, in order to clear the sky above, protecting the launch window. This seems to demonstrate that they are determined not to let anything delay the launch any further (or that given a choice between destroying the telescope or destroying Santa, the range safety officer chooses the latter). "Range Safety Officer" is the job title of a person in charge of the safety of a launch. Range safety officer and other similar range officers are the subject of [[2876: Range Safety]]. That was the first comic after New Years day in 2024, so seems like Randall contemplated rocket launches around the Holidays... Also earlier in the Christmas comic of 2023 he also killed Santa using [[Hydrothermal Vents]]. Before this he has only killed Santa back in 2008 in the [[2008 Christmas Special]]. | ||
| β | Airspace is normally [https://simpleflying.com/rocket-launches-airline-traffic/ closed to air traffic] to avoid collisions between aircraft and rocket launches. While Santa might not know about such restrictions, he already knows about this particular launch because thousands of astronomy geeks have asked for a new space telescope as a Christmas present in their letters to Santa, and the easiest way for Santa to deliver such a present is just keeping a safe distance from the launch pad. Moreover {{w|NORAD}} [https://www.noradsanta.org/en/ tracks Santa]'s flying around the world and would be able to give sufficient warning to both Santa and Ground Control to prevent such a close encounter of a festive kind; as well as to prevent accidental global thermonuclear war by {{w|1983 Soviet nuclear false alarm incident|confusing a | + | Airspace is normally [https://simpleflying.com/rocket-launches-airline-traffic/ closed to air traffic] to avoid collisions between aircraft and rocket launches. While Santa might not know about such restrictions, he already knows about this particular launch because thousands of astronomy geeks have asked for a new space telescope as a Christmas present in their letters to Santa, and the easiest way for Santa to deliver such a present is just keeping a safe distance from the launch pad. Moreover {{w|NORAD}} [https://www.noradsanta.org/en/ tracks Santa]'s flying around the world and would be able to give sufficient warning to both Santa and Ground Control to prevent such a close encounter of a festive kind; as well as to prevent accidental global thermonuclear war by {{w|1983 Soviet nuclear false alarm incident|confusing a pack of flying reindeer}} with a first-strike attack by a foreign power. Finally, Santa Claus performs deliveries overnight, while the launch is scheduled for [https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/24/science/webb-telescope-launch-date-livestream.html morning local time], so the timing of such a collision would not occur. |
The JWST has been referenced previously in [[1730: Starshade]], [[2014: JWST Delays]], [[2447: Hammer Incident]] and [[2550: Webb]], is on the list of payloads in [[1461: Payloads]] and its planned use was indirectly referenced in [[975: Occulting Telescope]]. Santa is known to [[838|maintain a list of humans]] responsible for technological incidents and to have suitable punishment for offenders. 12 days after launch it was referenced again in [[2564: Sunshield]]. | The JWST has been referenced previously in [[1730: Starshade]], [[2014: JWST Delays]], [[2447: Hammer Incident]] and [[2550: Webb]], is on the list of payloads in [[1461: Payloads]] and its planned use was indirectly referenced in [[975: Occulting Telescope]]. Santa is known to [[838|maintain a list of humans]] responsible for technological incidents and to have suitable punishment for offenders. 12 days after launch it was referenced again in [[2564: Sunshield]]. | ||
