Atlantis' clandestine departure..?

[Aesop]

Is it possible for Atlantis to liftoff with its cloak active? I ask because there doesn't appear to be a way for it to leave Earth if it ever needed to without people witnessing the event and exposing the stargate program, short of incapacitating the whole region anyway.

I don't remember any precedent for the stardrive operating simultaneously with the cloak active, although I suppose the puddle jumper would be an example of the two working in conjunction...

[hedwig]

If it had enough ZPMs, it could lift off cloaked and with the shield up. Otherwise, they couldn't lift off cloaked. If they did, they'd have to switch to the shield as soon as they got high enough in the atmosphere, or they'd all die.

[jelgate]

I see to recall them saying they could only cloak or shield. The city can't do both due to how the cloak uses the shield generators. So you could technically lift off while cloaked but it would be unadvisiable once you left the atomsphere

[thekillman]

It can't lift off both cloaked and shielded. it's or-or.

Also, given that it's a CITY taking off, it doesn't matter: the city is going to be seen anyway. It has to drop the cloak at one point to raise the shields, and the shields need to be raised in the atmosphere. Given it's massive size, this thing is going to be seen for many many miles.

I mean, if you want to calculate: you know the size of an aircraft, and the height they fly at. You can still see them.

There are two sort-of possibilities:

use the cloak to get to a sufficiently desolate place (like the arctic) by floating, or

use a sufficiently misty morning as cover (which isn't gonna work if there is not enough mist and clouds)

[Lt.Colonel John Sheppard]

what about the zpm on the odyssey will they use that one?

[garhkal]

Wouldn't matter. Unless the Odyessy can cloak other things..

But while we could cloak the city, we could NOT cloak the wave wash.

[Snowman37]

Why would the city leave Earth? It's the SGC's greatest asset... well... ever.

[Durgia]

I am sure they could figure it out with all the tech, take it to one of poles and temporarily take out some satellites, produce a bunch of fog etc. If we could miss the huge space battle with a superhive vs Atlantis and missed the entrance of a huge object into our atmosphere I am sure we could miss it leaving too.

Then they could take it to the dark side of the moon.

[Snowman37]

How could people miss two huge space ships duking it out in orbit? Simple answer, they wouldn't. Atlantis's descent was masked as a fireball, and the cloak kicked in soon after. I can see this being missed, but the space battle? Come on. Really, "Lost City" and "Enemy at the Gate" are episodes where the SGC should have gone public because someone looked up and saw space ships in the sky.

There is no dark side of the moon, but there is a far side of the moon. Why relocate to the moon? Less gravity, no atmosphere, which means a drain on the power to maintain artificial gravity, atmosphere, and the shield. It'd make more sense to simply relocate to Antarctica where the city was originally. From there, just scramble satellites whenever they try to take pictures of the area. Convenient data corruption.

[sgelite]

If it had enough ZPMs, it could lift off cloaked and with the shield up. Otherwise, they couldn't lift off cloaked. If they did, they'd have to switch to the shield as soon as they got high enough in the atmosphere, or they'd all die.

But would extra zpm's do it, I think I remember that when they first converted the shield into a cloak it was nothing to do with the power requirements, they literally turned the shield into a cloak so extras power wouldn't be a factor, I think.

[sgelite]

OOPS just read a bit further down and KILLMAN said basically the same thing, sorry killman.
You know whatthey say "great minds think alike" although they also say" fools seldom differ" so....

[The Flyattractor]

How could people miss two huge space ships duking it out in orbit? .

Because they were all to busy with their mp3s/tablets/reality tv to notice....at least the americans/europeans/chinese/japanese were. The others wouldn't matter.

[Supreme Commander Sil]

What I don't get is that I thought they hooked up the cloaking generator to the shield generator... So wouldn't the cloak be a shield too? In any case, I'm sure they could rig something so that both could work simultaneously.


Why didn't the ancients have cloaks on it, I must ask? They are so far ahead of any race.... But they didn't think of having a cloak for the city? Or a phase-shifter built in? (Maybe they struggled with being out of phase not implying falling through floors - planets in this case)?


I reckon these systems should be in place and just not discovered yet by the Tau'ri.

[The Flyattractor]

Cause it was made by the Ancients and lets face it They really weren't that smart.

[The Urban Spaceman]

Is it possible for Atlantis to liftoff with its cloak active?

I don't see why they would even use the cloak, because as soon as they reach the upper atmosphere they'd need to switch to shield, to preserve the atmosphere and avoid all the junk we fired into orbit. If the switch didn't happen or the timing was off, everyone on Atlantis would die.

I don't remember any precedent for the stardrive operating simultaneously with the cloak active, although I suppose the puddle jumper would be an example of the two working in conjunction...

The puddle jumpers do not have star drives, they only have impulse power. That is why they go through Stargates.

If it had enough ZPMs, it could lift off cloaked and with the shield up.

No. The way the cloak is routed through the shield generators makes it an either/or situation.

What I don't get is that I thought they hooked up the cloaking generator to the shield generator... So wouldn't the cloak be a shield too?

No.

In any case, I'm sure they could rig something so that both could work simultaneously.

Also, no.

Why didn't the ancients have cloaks on it, I must ask? They are so far ahead of any race.... But they didn't think of having a cloak for the city?

Because when Atlantis was built in the Milky Way, many years ago, there was no need for a cloak. They had no enemies until they came to the Pegasus galaxy and created the Wraith -- at which point it was too late. The Wraith knew where Atlantis was, and because one cannot have a cloak and a shield simultaneously, the Wraith would easily have been able to destroy Atlantis.

I reckon these systems should be in place and just not discovered yet by the Tau'ri.

The Tau'ri are already cheesy munchkin powergamers, you want to give them the ability to cloak, phase and shield all at the same time? It's not like they need the help. They've already gotten rid of all of their enemies (except the Wraith, who are stuck in another galaxy). Besides, who knows, maybe Destiny was supposed to continue the cheesy munchkin powergamer gig, who knows what kind of amazing super-powers it has, other than being able to fly into a sun and store human consciousness in its memory and dock with seed-ships to become SuperMechaDestinyTransformer.

I'm sorta glad they cancelled it...