Daedalus landing on the pier

[garhkal]

Wraith ships don't... so why would ours?

[gateraid]

I wouldn't be so sure about that. Off the top of my head, I can only think of the one Todd crash landed into the ocean and the one in Submersion. Both ships were damaged, so it's not a fair representation.

The jumpers don't float. When Shep did a controlled landing in Grace Under Pressure, it sank straight away. But I would imagine the jumpers are quite heavy relative to their small size.

The one thing I would question about the Deadalus is that when it landed the first time, Caldwell said their shields were damaged. If that went as far as forcefields, then they would have been in trouble, because the 302 bays would have flooded, and that would have sunk the Deadalus for sure.

[Snowman37]

I wouldn't be so sure about that. Off the top of my head, I can only think of the one Todd crash landed into the ocean and the one in Submersion. Both ships were damaged, so it's not a fair representation.

In "Submersion," the Wraith ship simply sank to the floor of the ocean where if soft landed. In "Infection," Todd's Wraith hive broke in half. The front half fell towards the Earth and soft landed upon the ocean. Given that the ship had broken in half, flooding and sinking was inevitable.

Can someone post an aerial shot of Atlantis with the Daedalus at the pier?

[LT. COL. John Sheppard]

1st one looks like water

[ZRFTS]

One could make arguements for both cases (why it should land on the pier itself vs why it should land on the water eg the added weight to the pier, its engines burning a hole in the pier vs the stress placed on the hull instead of the struts/legs) but I think they did it because it was a cool shot

I have to agree; frankly it doesn't matter whether or not it landed in the water or the pier because that is one cool shot. The visual shots in that picture are impressive.

[FrenchMassacre]

1st one looks like water

Could it be that the pier / landing platform is stored inside the city and extends when a ship lands? This platform would extend under the water and rise to sea level between two of the city's "branches". Therefore there would be a bit of water on it while it rises giving this illusion. From the images we see of Atlantis, there is nothing that looks like a landing platform, at least for me. Mostly considering that Aurora class ships were quite large, it is unlikely to be just "hard to spot".

However, it is well possible that the city does not have a landing platform of any kind, the ancients wouldn't really have seen the use for one and the added weight could be problematic to maneuvre the city. We have seen the prometheus hover in SG-1 episodes, it can be assumed that the deadalus can do the same and could "hover over the water" to be within the shields..

[McAvoy]

The Deadalus could be built out of highly dense materials, more so than your modern day naval vessel. It would have be very dense, much heavier than steel.

Though the design of the ship allows it's weight to be more spread out so if it did float, it could have a shallow draft. (amount of ship underwater).