The Logistics of Building and Operating the Millennium Falcon

THE LOGISTICS OF BUILDING AND OPERATING THE MILLENNIUM FALCON Ship name: The Millennium Falcon Manufacturer: Corellian Engineering Corporation Model: YT-1300f light freighter Maximum Speed: 1,050 km/h Length: c. 34.52 - 34.75 meters Ti Cargo Capacity: 100 metric tons Hyperdrive Rating: Class 0.5 Hyperdrive System: Isu-Sim SSPO5 Hyperdrive • BUILDING THE MILLENNIUM FALCON • Before we get into the cost of the parts and technology, we need to consider how much it would cost to get the raw materials, the talent, the team and the space to build this legendary ship... Leasing a NASA airfield and building a suitable hangar for construction C. £1 million Approximately 23 tonnes of steel and titanium needed for construction Full time salaries for a full NASA trained construction crew (approx 100 people) C. £5.2 million c. £900,000 • FINDING THE RIGHT TECHNOLOGY • As much as we'd love to see a real-life Falcon, the technology used by the Corellian Engineering Corporation to build the ship simply doesn't exist. So, to get a reasonably accurate cost of building the ship, we'll need to look at the closest real-world equivalents. So let's get started... - =EL ... Armour plating on ship Falcon Deflector shield Quadex power Communications jammer navicomputer core IN REAL-LIFE: IN REAL-LIFE: IN REAL-LIFE: IN REAL-LIFE: IN REAL-LIFE: Nuclear propulsion Magnesium 5 inch plating High-power phone jammer Trophy active protection Titan supercomputer reactor £750,000 £1,000 £68m £200,000 £63m Girodyne sublight engines Нyperdrive generator Blaster cannon Concussion Falcon dish & AG-2G cannons missiles antenna IN REAL-LIFE: IN REAL-LIFE: IN REAL-LIFE: IN REAL-LIFE: IN REAL-LIFE: Two Falcon 'FTL' travel Laser weapon Advanced air- 12m SKA heavy rockets research centre systems to-air missiles antenna £110m £1.8bn £230m £2.5m £500,000 STAFFING THE SHIP • If you want the ship to be fully operational, you'll need a team to staff it. We know it can be run by only two pilots, but you'll need more than that to have it combat ready... Pilot Co-Pilot Gunners A fully trained NASA pilot to be the Hans Solo of the You'll need at least two A fully trained NASA pilot to be the Chewbacca of the Millennium Falcon c. £60,000 per year gunners to keep the ship combat ready c. £50,000 per year Millennium Falcon c. £60,000 per year • PROPERLY MAINTAINING THE FALCON • If you want the ship to be fully operational, you'll need a team to staff it. We know it can be run by only two pilots, but you'll need more than that to have it combat ready... Replacement Parts Replacing parts from standard wear and tear would be ongoing c. £500,000 per year Mechanical Man Hours Annual Maintenance Just to keep the Falcon running smoothly you'd need to shell out c. £2 million per year The labour costs of maintaining the Falcon would not be cheap c. £350,000 per year • FUEL, FOOD, FLUIDS AND DOCKING • It's all very well building the ship and maintaining it, but to fly it you'll need to recharge the fuel cells, replace the fluids (water, lubricants, coolants), replace the oxygen and feed the crew, plus you'll need to dock the ship at spaceports to do this during missions. The following assumes at least 3 months in space each year... Ш11 Docking the Ship An Imperial Class spaceport would set you back 150 credits a day. Docking for 15-20 days would cost c. £1,000 per year Recharging Fuel Cells Recharging all of the 50 fuel cells 12 times a year, if charging quickly would set you back c. £2,000 per year Food and Fluids To replenish all fluids and oxygen, and supply all 4 crew members with basic proteins you'd need c. £2,000 per year *Costs worked out at an exchange rate of 1 Galactic Credit = 0.37 GBP THE GROUND CREW AND LAUNCH • Just like any space flight taking off from Earth, you'll need a full NASA-trained ground crew to monitor your progress, status and health, and that doesn't come cheap... A full ground crew would consist of 15-20 positions, including a Flight Director, a Guidance Office, a Propulsion Systems Engineer and several other crucial team members. This would set you back c. £750,000 per year You'll also need to build the control center and launch the Falcon. According to NASA, the average cost to launch a Space Shuttle is C. £310 million • THE COST OF BUILDING & USING A MILLENNIUM FALCON • So, let's have a look at the final totals for building and operating a real-life Millennium Falcon... You may need to give Bill Gates or Roman Abramovich a call| ANNUAL COSTS These need to be paid ASAP! Hans, Flight Crew ... Maintenance .. . Fuelling, restocking . £5,000 .£170,000 £2,850,000 BUILD COSTS Building Technology .... £2,474,951,000 Launch £7,100,000 Ground Crew £750,000 ... £175,000 Buffer Budget .. . £1,000,000 Standby Crew £310,000,000 TOTAL DUE: TOTAL DUE (P/A): £2,792,051,000 £4,950,000 Sources: http://www.starwars.com | http://www.sgs-engineering.com | http://nasa.gov | http://www.wsj.com http://scifi.stackexchange.com | http://astro.cornell.edu | http://www.galacticempiredatabank.com http://starwars.wikia.com | http://www.dailymail.co.uk/ | http://www.bbc.co.uk | http://www.heavy.com http://buildmillenniumfalcon.com | http://www.spacex.com http://rsc.org | http://news.bbc.co.uk http://www.space.com | http://www.designbysoap.co.uk | http://www.thisismoney.co.uk http://www.swotr.com http://www.crizmo.com https://community.fantasyflightgames.com http://www.raf.mod.uk | http://www.cnet.com | http://www.quora.com | http://www.mirror.co.uk VAROOMA