Our asteroid survival: A fictitional history of the ten year survival of a large ELE asteroid impact by a small, pre advised, group Read online

  Index

  Index

  Chapter 1. Beginning.

  Chapter 2. Building & Fitting Out.

  Chapter 3. Our Home; For the Duration.

  Chapter 4. Government Facilities and Failures.

  Chapter 4. Plans, Preparation & Evacuation.

  Chapter 5. Impact & Aftermath.

  Chapter 6. Early Days.

  Chapter 7. Our First Rescue Mission.

  Chapter 8. A New Technology Base.

  Chapter 9. A Continuum.

  Chapter 10. Opening The Doors.

  Chapter 10. Opening The Doors.

  Chapter 11. Life In A Burrow.

  Chapter 12. Looking For New Friends.

  Chapter 13. A New Continuum.

  Chapter 14. We Have An Enemy.

  Chapter 15. Peace But Not Plenty.

  Chapter 16. Doors Close Again.

  Chapter 17. Free Again.

  Chapter 1. Beginning.

  I wish my reader to note that what I present here is, from my perspective, a record of our survival groups last ten years. This history has been written in response to a request made by the elected representatives of our northern Spain survival group. Those requesting this work assured me that it would be useful to have a record based on the recollections of an “initial group” survivor of the recent world holocaust. The period recorded here is that interlude between early 2052, when there arrived within our solar system a potential extinction event, and today. At that time I could hardly refuse such a request.

  If you should feel the need to criticise my efforts I hope you will appreciate that the reason I was invited to carry out this task was not due to any demonstrated literary talent on my part but was far more probably due to the fact that my injuries and training removed me from any current research projects or tasks involving physical labour; the request was, therefore, to give me an honest job.

  When writing this history I have always been at a loss to know how I should present such a history in a manner that might appeal to those future readers having some interest in the early history of his, or her, civilization. It was, however, my objective that on reading this account you, the reader, might understand the reasons for some of our decisions and appreciate that we made our best efforts to create a better society out of the wreckage of the old.

  I will start by introducing a small group of old friends that made up our “initial group”. These persons were those with whom I had the privilege of starting this adventure. I have used the first family name rather than the Spanish convention of two; being first the father’s followed by the mother’s family names. This small group of lecturers, a professor and their families making up our “initial group” were myself Mariano Martinez, my wife Julia and daughter Felicita then aged 8; Tomas Prieto, his wife Felisa and son Fernando aged 19; Edmundo Fernández, his wife Maria and baby son Jason; and lastly Francisco Garcia, and wife Madonna.

  I suppose I could justify a claim that it was this group that initiated a set of circumstances that, with the later assistance of other groups of survivors, allowed the reinitializing of a relatively low level technologically based society after the destruction of the original. However, it would also be a valid comment that had we not been members of that “initial group” we would probably not have been among those invited into the later “original group”. Our skill sets were not those that would have been instantly recognized as those required to reboot a society. What is undeniably true is that we were highly educated, within our fields, but we had not the wide range of knowledge experience and capabilities required to reboot a civilization. The reason for our inclusion, within the shelter group (the “original group”), was the sheer good fortune that we had obtained the necessary information, regarding the impact event, at its earliest inception. This knowledge allowed us the time to take the necessary actions required for our survival and, fortunately and probably most importantly, we had, within this group, the necessary drive to bring it to a satisfactory conclusion.

  In our choice of personnel for our “original group” we made mistakes. Amongst these were the exclusion of such important experts as a geologist, an experimental archaeologist, a shoemaker and even a hairdresser. The former two would later prove essential for rebooting manufacturing this being a precursor for developing our technology. We were, indeed, very lucky to obtain such expertise by chance rather than by design.

  As I informed those requesting this history it would be, and has been, presented from my prospective as there exists little paper and even less recoverable electronic records related to the time these actions were taking place. The details recorded here had been those stored in that flexible and potentially erroneous resource; my memory. It should also be noted that during this period there was very little time or material for the production of a written diary hence none exists. In addition I must make it clear that although I was involved in most of the original work the presentation of the post impact period will inevitably result in some important elements of our adventures being missing from this record.

  I begin my story at the occasion we first heard of the potential danger to our then way of life. This knowledge was revealed to those of us making up the “initial group” during a refractory conversation at the University of Alcala, near Madrid, in Spain. Tomas, a professor of communications and our team leader, was getting quite excited about an asteroid that had been seen through the solar corona by a satellite monitoring the solar atmosphere. The “initial group” members had been involved, as participants within an European Space Agency (ESA) group, in the design of the satellite’s communication package. Tomas had been rewarded with such information as a courtesy due to our continuing work for that organization.

  Apparently this diminutive piece of flotsam was rapidly moving towards earth and some early orbital calculations had indicated that it might pass close enough to be visible with the naked eye. We hoped to be able to observe this asteroid using the new optical telescope at the Yebes observatory near Guadalajara. A few days later a much exited Tomas called a very private meeting in his office. He advised the members of his group that the orbital calculations had been refined and indicated that there was now a high probability that this fourteen kilometres, in all dimensions, ballistic missile, about the same as that that ended the reign of the dinosaurs, would hit the earth in about 9 months. Its arrival would be just before Christmas; not exactly the present mankind would have expected. We were advised that this information was highly restricted and could not be divulged to anyone. He had received permission to advise us as we were his team and he had personally vouched for our discretion.

  This information was vague but certainly got our attention. The team knew that “high probability”, in this context, should be construed (because of its implications) as a near certainty. We were all aware that a deflection of such a large object, in so short a time, would probably not be an option. This information was obviously extremely disturbing and would obviously require our immediate attention. We needed, very rapidly, to produce a recovery scenario that might result in the preservation of our families; presuming the currently available information would be confirmed.

  We knew that this information would not be generally available until the authorities (meaning inevitably, in this case, politicians) had been convinced of its accuracy and had time for their, behind closed doors, discussions. The old excuse of not wanting to panic the public would be
reeled out if nothing happened; otherwise no explanation would be necessary. In my cynical opinion their discussions would lead to little effective action other than ensuring that a command and control system would be available, in well stocked highly protected places, for themselves.

  The “leaders” allocated to these refuges would, inevitably, include the political and social elite with some protecting military. In reality this would ensure the continuation of a political elite with their hangers on. Such a group would be of little use and certainly unable to function effectively, without support, within any new world order that might survive such an apocalypse.

  Without effective and pre-planned engineering and organisational capacity their leadership would inevitably lead to a rapid decent into a state of incompetently led barbarism; at the very best feudalism. I was reminded of those survivors of a spacecraft crash in that great fiction book “The hitchhikers guide to the galaxy” and could imagine the potential of a world, after a technological collapse, being controlled by such individuals. The reinitializing of a new technologically based society, rather than a short term Plato republic, would probably not be possible.

  Our “initial group” agreed that this would inevitably result in an unacceptable, to us, human continuum. The average politician would be unable to survive outside of an ordered structure where his, or her, needs would not be provided by others more able, though possibly willing, to do the work for them. A system based on such incompetent elites would inevitably become parasitic. The citizens who survived the initial disaster would, without a well structured and competent management, be unable to function for long. This would inevitably result, within a short period, in barbarism which might then initiate the extinction of the human species.

  Our “initial group” was not prepared to accept such a scenario. It, therefore, became our objective to provide a viable alternative for the future our families. We were fully aware that this would be a new and far less comfortable lifestyle for our families. The idea, however, that we would be better off directly under the arriving asteroid was not considered as a viable alternative. Working for our survival had instantly become the only valid option and we would do our best to achieve this whilst maintaining a modest, though acceptable, long term level of comfort with interest in a recovery being a very important, if initially, a secondary objective. To survive within unacceptable conditions for any long period would not be conducive to maintaining a tolerable long term mental state.

  The team immediately set to work on our new project. Our initial objectives were to design, build and outfit a suitable sanctuary, within the available time-frame, to optimize the survival potential of a small group. We would populate this group with those we considered had the potential and will to a) survive; and b) develop, protect and maintain a level of technology from which an acceptable, to us, new, technology based recovery would be practical.

  We decided our initial objective would be the recovery and maintaining of a technology level of the middle to late Victorian era. This we considered would, with specialized technical support, be within our capability to achieve. We further decided we would include electrical power generation within our objectives as gas illumination and heating would not be practical due to our sanctuary, which rapidly became a shelter, environment and the shortage of necessary materials. Our decisions were seen as optimistic, though potentially practical, objectives given a specialized group of highly educated and/or capable individuals dedicated to the solution of any problems.

  From such a level, we believed, a new, high technology society could, within a few generations, be recovered. We were in the position of a technologically based Robinson Crusoe society. We would choose our “men (or women) Fridays” and obtain the capability of building our accommodation to meet the prospective conditions during and after the asteroid impact. We would, of course, be without any realistic possibility of external rescue from our marooning within a then potentially barren wilderness. From what was left, after the disaster, we would have to recreate our new civilization. It would be necessary to accept the task of initially setting up this civilization within our underground shelter. This would have to be maintainable and completely self sufficient in all things for an unknown period of time. We would have to achieve this in circumstances where we were unable to fully predict even our initial working conditions. This recovery would become our greatest test and we would have, somehow, to consider it as an opportunity.

  We allowed ourselves a week to outline a plan of actions which would include both human resources and physical requirements necessary to meet the long term needs of our group. This would allow for better orbital calculations to, hopefully, indicate a potential impact site. Fortunately with ESA´s new quantum computer systems this had recently become possible. There would be no point in planning our shelter where we would have the dubious pleasure of observing the impact very shortly before our extinction.

  The next week the group met again in Tomas’s office and heard that the impact had been confirmed to over a ninety eight percent probability. This had been made possible by the new quantum supercomputer and some very sophisticated observations by new satellite networks. The impact was now predicted to be somewhere off the distant southern coast of West Africa. This, though still vague and rather closer than ideal to our Spanish retreat, gave us several options.

  After a little thought we decided to create our refuge in the lower Spanish Pyrenees, near Lleida, where one of our team, Francisco, had a holiday retreat about one thousand five hundred meters above sea level. He had restored the house and outbuildings which, initially, had no mains electricity and was still without running water. Very positive, from our point of view, was the benefit of a good, reliable, potable well with indications of other underground movements of this material nearby. Our ability to obtain and store water, within the shelter, would be a major survival limitation. Reliable sources of water close to the shelter were, therefore, seen as a definite advantage. The shelter would be on the southern slope of an east west valley. The southern peak should, hopefully, protect us from any major blast effects from the south. Additionally it was distant from and well above sea level. Both factors were potentially important as the impact could be expected to be in deep water and a large tsunami, on the western seaboard of the Spanish peninsular could be considered a high probability.

  One year before we had received knowledge of the expected impact, mains electricity had been installed in the house. This had been installed as new electric cables were being installed, on pylons, through the valley to meet the increased demands of a nearby village. This village was beautifully situated adjacent to a small fishing lake; hence, in itself, an ideal holiday resort. This new work had made the installation of electricity to the house a viable, if still expensive, proposition. We therefore had an energy resource that would enable us to maintain workers and long term invitees at the house and also power some of the required building equipment. When we retreated into our shelter it would then provide us with temporary electrical energy, until that source was lost to us, which would allow us to preserve a small but potentially valuable amount of our proposed diesel resources.

  The house still had its solar panels, a relatively small, modern, fifty volt, deep cycle battery system and a diesel generator that we could use during the working period. Though the generator would be available we would try to minimise its use to further maintain our diesel stocks. This material would be our primary initial energy resource whilst incarcerated in the shelter. Due to the importance, to us, of this material we obtained a considerable quantity of an appropriate anti bacterial to control any possible microbial contamination of our diesel during its long term storage. Microbial growth in the diesel could cause filter blockages amongst other inconveniences.

  An additional advantage of our proposed shelter location was that the nearest village, being the one by the lake, was over twelve kilometres distant. This would hopefully provide us with sufficient privacy to cont
inue our work. This privacy had recently been enhanced as the road passing our proposed work site was now little used as a better road had been constructed, with a bridge over the river, when they had upgraded the electricity supply.

  The house was large with a sizeable cellar that we initially considered integrating directly into our shelter. The problem of working round the house, however, convinced us that this was not viable and instead we used it for initial storage for such items as logs, coal, bicycles etc.

  Later we would develop this cellar as a quarantine area. The quarantine accommodation would be available for potential additional personnel, after the impact, thus assisting in protecting us from potentially dangerous bacterial or virus infections that any guests might have acquired during their adventures. The cellar would be made suitable for limited habitation with lighting, powered from the shelter, stored food and a wired communication connection with the main shelter.

  This quarantine cellar would, in time, become acceptably comfortable accommodation and some time later we would open a walk-able tunnel between it and the shelter. The opening of this tunnel was planned and we designed this possibility into the shelter’s reinforcing structure at its inception. This future tunnel would be on the upper shelter level so quarantine entry would be along a mildly inclined passage.

  One of our first upgrades, during our planning period for the shelter, was to make the entrance of the cellar (quarantine area) much stronger than the original simple door and staircase within the house. The new entrance system was placed at the bottom of the original staircase and was a one point eight by one point two five meter, strongly hinged, lockable, fibre insulated, one centimetre thick, metallically armoured door. This was partly to improve insulation and partly as protection for our guests against any unwelcome visitors attempting to enter their abode.

  We also installed two simple drop toilets with outflows to the downward slope past the house itself. The outflow pipes were installed using a specialized drill rented by our builder. This drill removed the necessity of digging a trench; a potentially dangerous and difficult undertaking at that place. Later we installed proper toilet units with a bend and flushing unit to enhance the cellar atmosphere. There was insufficient time to complete this work before the impact hence it was left until some later time when it provided useful work for some of the inmates using material taken from our guest’s homes and our builder’s stores.