Finding ships in deep space ought not be totally impossible...just very
unlikely.
Over the whole imperium, there are 16 sectors at 1280 parsec-sided hexes each
for a total of about 20500 hexes. Given some space around the edges, call it
25,000.
Now, next you get to estimate how many starships are operating in those
regions (to determine loss rates and densities). The military operates
probably more than 20,000 starships; let's call it 30,000. Add in the
scouts (10,000 type S alone) for about 45,000 starships in imperial service
at any one time. Civillian usage is probably higher, or around 100,000.
Assuming military starships last 100 years (mean) and civilian ones 50 years,
we can figure out how many have been built over the history of the Imperium.
An average of 450 military ships per year, and about 1000 civilian ships per
year are built. (These are probably accurate to about a factor of 2)
Next, we do reliability. I'd figure that they're
about as reliable as modern airliners are, or perhaps one loss per
hundred thousand flights. That translates to 25 per 100,000 per year, or about
0.0025 percent. Making it a conservative case, call it 0.1 percent per year.
This would mean that over an average starfaring lifetime of 50 years, a
starship has a (roughly) 5% chance of being lost for some reason. This,
combined with the above starship production rate estimates, leads to an
average loss rate (all causes) of about 50 military and about as many civilian
ships per year. 100 ships per year, into 25,000 hexes. Average density after
1000 years of Third Imperium: 4 ships per hex.
Now, most of these ships aren't lost due to misjump. Most will be lost
to combat, accident, crash on planet, etc. If airliner statistics are
accurate, something like 75%-90% of all accidents happen at takeoff or
landing. Presuming most of the rest are misjumps, that leaves us with an
average density of 1 to 0.5 ships per hex.
Now, it's possible that this is a factor of 2, perhaps even 5 higher.
Let's work through numbers for both...
Worst case: 0.5 ships per hex
You have to find the ship (ROb Dean gave an idea how hard), and there's
only 50% chance one's there in that hex anyway.
Best Case: 5 ships per hex
Not too bad, the RMS distance to the closest misjump victim is
probably less than a lightyear. With any luck he's still got a radio
beacon going or somesuch.
The worst problem with these assumptions is that a misjumped ship dies
where it jumps to. In all likelyhood, the crew buttons up in cold sleep, fires
up the drives (if possible), and makes a slow boat to somewhere to the nearest
civilization. Even if the drives are out, a tight-beam radio message to
the nearest system will get there in 3-10 years, and someone can jump out and
get you (at least the crew, likely salvage the whole ship).
In short:
There aren't that many misjumped missing ships. It's hard to find
them. And you have to assume they're dumb. 8-)
- - -george william herbert
[email removed]