Save Jebediah Kerman - A Kerbal Space Program adventure

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Jebediah Kerman. Larger than life. A man's man. Hero. The first Kerbonaut to orbit the planet. A veteran four prior manned missions to space. Granted, one didn't make it to orbit before he had to eject, and one exploded on the launch pad, but he was still willing and able to go, whenever his country called upon him.

And now he's on mission number five. For a man like Jebediah, these things seem routine nowadays. Mostly because despite his courage, he isn't all that bright. Half of his missions before this one ended in spectacular failure. But Jebediah don't care, he's like the honey badger. It was supposed to be so simple. "We just need you to do a few orbits, Jeb," they said. His objective was to continue fine tuning the Kerbal Space Association's (KSA) launch program. "Practice your piloting skills and we'll send you to the Mun!,"they promised. Jebediah said yes. How could he not? Space flight is all he knew. So, up he went. Again.

Jebediah had never practiced to do a spacewalk. In fact, nobody told him to DO a spacewalk. Jebediah wouldn't let those minor details get in his way. So, unbeknownst to ground contol, out the hatch he went. Things were going great until he let go of the hand holds. Things went from bad to worse when he finally figured out how to turn on the jetpack. Things went from worse to worse than worse as he jetted away from his now unmanned space ship. Eventually, he figured out how to fly that crazy jetpack (after drifting 1.7 km away from his ship). Never one to panic, or acknowledge/recognize fear Jebediah closed the gap and made it back to the ship. Except he couldn't grab on to the hand holds. Burning up precious jetpack fuel, Jebediah continued his quest to get back on board.

Numerous small corrections eventually drained the jetpack's fuel. Inertia is slowly carrying him away from the ship. Stranded in space, secure in his orbit, Jebediah is poised to remain there for eternity. He probably doesn't even realize it. Godspeed, Jebediah...Godspeed.

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So there you have it. Jebediah is stuck in orbit, his spaceship floats tantalizingly close by. He can't get to it, and it can't get to him. D'oh! As I learn how to do things in KSP, I wasn't planning for this. I figured I'd progressively work my way up to bigger challenges, but now it is time to try and save Jebediah Kerman.

The plan? Don't know for sure. First, I suppose will be to launch a rescue ship to see if I can fly close enough that he can grab hold. Assuming that works, launching a space station module would be next. Perhaps he can hang on as we then try and dock to the space station. At least he can sit in there and I can rotate him and other Kerbonauts on/off of it. Will any of this work? Probably not. Will I waste lots of time trying? Probably yes.

Rather than clutter the Kerbal Space Program thread with my random thoughts on this project, I figure I will document them here. Of course, the "simplest" solution would be to send up a three man capsule with no more than two Kerbonauts but I don't know how, or if that's possible. So we'll try the more difficult path. Jebediah Kerman wouldn't want it any other way.

[britrock88]

Awesome.

[pbot]

One of the many problems facing a brand new space program is the lack of depth. Who do you call when times are tough, when things are looking bleak? The cagey veteran who has seen it all. The KSA is no different in that regard. But, they do have one man they can count on, one man who is not afraid to look danger in the eye without blinking. The kind of man they write folk songs about. "Who do you turn to in times of danger / who is not afraid of that handsome stranger / Jeb-eh-die-uh Ker-man!" (editor's note: what the hell?). Unfortunately, that man is hopelessly trapped in orbit as we speak.

So, as the KSA director said "we go to space with the kerbonauts we have, not necessarily the kerbonauts we want", or something like that. And now, please welcome to this tale...Bill Kerman!

Bill is new to space flight, but strapped into a specially designed rescue rocket he's going to give it everything he's got. 110% and whatever other cliches fit the situation. Good luck, Bill!

Unfortunately, Bill made a rookie mistake, he is a rookie after all, and burned up all his fuel trying to get to orbit. With no fuel to maneuver, he managed to make it 3/4 of the way around before landing safely back on Kerbin. No worries, Bill. Jeb's got the rest of his life to wait for you.

Rescue Mission #1 Results: FAILURE

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Yes, Bill K was provided a rescue capsule. It was loaded up with hand holds figuring that Jeb could grab on if it got close to him. Several rcs rockets and lots of fuel were added as well. We even threw on a couple spot lights for when the orbit took him around to the dark side of Kerbin. Time to be a bit more careful with the fuel burn.

[Radii]

epic introduction, I'm following!

[pbot]

Oh, just realized it's not BOB Kerman, it is BILL Kerman. Bill gets so little respect around the KSA that we couldn't even get his name right. Sorry, Bill.

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Bill is currently in orbit, slooowly chasing down Jebediah and Jebediah's spaceship. He didn't burn all his fuel, but did burn quite a bit. Does he have enough to get in position to reach his fellow kerbonaut? If yes, does he then have enough to de-orbit? Is this story about to have TWO stranded kerbonauts?

[Izulde]

Awesome, epic, and all the other standard superlatives.

[pbot]

Rescue Mission #2:
Bill got close. Close as defined across the vast distance of the universe anyway. But not close enough. He doesn't have the steely will of Jebediah Kerman. Bill chose to fight another day and de-orbited after several valiant, but ultimately failed attempts, to save his brave comrade. Bill will be back, oh yes. He will be back, indeed. Kerman's don't quit. They don't know what the word quit means. Literally.

Rescue Mission #2 results: FAILURE, but we'll give him a B- for the effort.

To be continued....

[pbot]

Rescue Mission #3:
Bill Kerman, fearless kerbonaut, made a third attempt to save Jebediah. He came within a few kilometers of pulling off a task that many had said was darn near impossible. He showed the kind of patience and skill needed for such a daunting task. Bill Kerman was one of the KSA's best and brightest. Bill Kerman....we hardly knew ye.

Bill Kerman was killed on his return to Kerbin. Sadly his parachute ripped away from the space capsule near the end of his descent and he was killed on impact. Mr. Kerman, we raise our glasses in toast, as a salute to you and for everything you stood for. Bill Kerman, hero.

Rescue Mission #3: CATASTROPHIC FAILURE.
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I'm not going to name names here, but I think somebody may have forgotten to turn off the warp during Bill's re-entry, causing his parachute to rip right off the top of the capsule. The next post will be left blank as a solemn "moment of silence" in Mr. Kerman's memory.

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.

[pbot]

Still reeling from the devastating and yet somewhat mysterious circumstances surrounding the death of Bill Kerman, the KSA quickly got back to the business of saving Jebediah. A high level executive meeting was held to map out the plan forward. Even someone with the intestinal fortitude and strong constitution of Jebediah Kerman could not stay up there forever. Something needed to be done, and done quickly. From the back of the room a solitary voice said "what if we sent an unmanned probe to get Jebediah?"

Everyone agreed this seemed to be a really good idea. However, the KSA had no unmanned probe technology or experience. Regardless, they set to work. Analyzing the telemetry data from the missions that Jebediah and Bill had undertaken they developed a kind of mechincal pilot. Unofficially it was known as "MechJeb". The computer programmer that developed it was not a rocket scientist, he just interpreted the telemetry data and wrote code to closely mimic what the kerbonauts had done. He pleaded with the real rocket scientists to read through his instruction manual. "Nonsense! We're rocket scientists!" they said. "Directions are for the weak, we are not weak." So, they didn't read the instructions.

The unmanned probe was quickly assembled. Many extra handholds were lashed to virtually every available surface of the craft. If they could get it close, Jebediah would have a variety of options to climb aboard.

On launch day, the scientists fired up the "mechjeb". "Hey look, this thing can plot trajectories to any target we choose, this should be easy," one commented. So they target locked on to Jeb and waited for the unmanned probe to save the day. Had they read the directions they would have realized that the rendevous calculator suggests a test launch to calibrate the intersection points properly for a specific rocket. But, they didn't.

"3....2....1....liftoff" and off the probe went. The mechjeb pilot put the probe into an orbit that closely matched Jebediah's. Except it was half an orbit away. Many orbits passed as slowly but surely the probe was catching up to Jebediah. Mechjeb runs on electrical power. The unmanned probe was loaded down with extra batteries and four gigantic solar panels. Electricity, glorious electricity, the probe was developed to have far more electrical capacity than it would ever need.

All seemed good as the game of orbital tag continued. No one thought that, ahem, extending the solar panels might be a "good idea". Eventually ground control wondered why the rescue probe was no longer responding to commands. Finally someone realized it had no electrical power. So now, it sits lifeless and dark, chasing Jebediah in an orbit that may never end.

Rescue Mission #4: FAILURE.

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On the next mission, I'll make it a point to actually deploy the solar panels. Knucklehead.

[britrock88]

Hahahahaha.

Loving this each and every step of the way.

[pbot]

First, thanks for the comments. Second, I ended up taking a personal day today due to family illness, and as I sit here, I'm thinking maybe instead of launching a rescue vessel, I'd be better off just using another small manned craft. Perhaps the lower mass will make it easier to close in. It seems as though I burn a lot of fuel just trying to get "close" and don't have enough in reserve to close the final gap.

[pbot]

So, after a week long hiatus, this thread is back from the dead. Apparently so is Bill Kerman as he pilots the next rescue mission. Anyhow, the un-dead kerbonaut once again comes close, but fails to get close enough, and Jebediah continues to orbit Kerbin. Jeb is now 5 days and 22 hours (in game time) into his adventure. The guys on youtube make this rendezvous thing look so easy, perhaps I should send them the save game file.

Hang in there Jebediah. We'll keep trying. For now.

Rescue Mission #5: Failure.