Friday Night Physics

OK, just under the wire here, but this counts for Friday, right?

THE SHIELD HELICARRIER:

I'm actually a bit torn in doing this, because the SHIELD HELICARRIER is just one of those things that are JUST THAT AWESOME. I mean, it's Kirby, right? And Kirby is Awesome, no? Look athe posters here, you know why there are no posters featuring the Helicarrier? Because no mere poster can contain the sheer awesome of that image and do it a lick of justice. NONE. But just because something is a cool visual, doesn't mean it's great sciences, as you are about to see.

OK, let's get the first bit out of the way: Newton's Third Law of physics: For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. So, those four Helicopter blades (or Fan jets, depending on the model) are pushing against the ground with a force equal to the weight of an AIRCRAFT CARRIER. Those things ain't light, which means that anything under those jets would get smushed. Nevermind any unlucky burds that would shredded to chicken grease if they fly into the engines.

There's also the question of design. Aircraft carriers are designed in such a way that...well, there aren't a lot of guns and whatnot at the bottom, and you would think that would be a major sticking point when designing an aircraft. Now, there's definetly a great deal of evidence to suggest that SHIELD has long since addressed this flaw and added some weapons to the underbelly. In addition, they would have had to make significant if not major structural changes to the frame, as Aircraft carriers are meant to be picked up like that (or at all really).

Then of course, there's the fact that the Helicarrier seems like a bad idea on the conceptual level:

-why does a SPY agency need to have a flying aircraft carrier? Seems that something that would attract that much attention really defeats the whole "stealthy spy" thing.

-Really, does having a slow moving aircraft carrier in the air really any better than having one in the water? I mean, it can't be that fast, or else there'd be a whole other ton of problems with aerodynamics and drag.

-In motion or not, the Helicarrier would be AT LEAST as hard to land on as a water-based Aircraft carrier.

-What is the strategic advantage of the Helicarrier? Making the supply lines for their aircraft shorter? Easy to pick up agents in the field? Or just to terrify the beejus out of everyone?

That last goal is accomplished very easily when you consider that the Helicarrier(s) are CONSTANTLY FALLING OUT OF THE FUCKING SKY! Seriously, it took one small superbrawl to initiate the whole SHRA, but a few dozen crashes of a nuclear-powered billion-ton trillion-dollar piece of machinery and everyone's cool? Seriously? WTF?

Just listing the most recent Helicarrier failures here:

1. Crashed when Starktech disabled (Secret Invasion)
2. Crashed in Ultron Attack (Mighty Avengers)
3. Crashed when hacked by Amadeus Cho (Incredible Hercules)
4. Crashed when attacked by Hydra-Hand alliance (Wolverine)
5. Near-Crash when attacked by Hydra (New Avengers/Civil war)
6. Near-Crash when attacked by Red Hulk (Hulk)

So, there you have it. Four crashes and two near-crashes in the last 3-4 years of comics, which is about...let's see...I'd say about 6-12 months "Marvel Time"? Yeah, real success there.