HMS Thunderchild!

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Wade Hampton III
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HMS Thunderchild!

Post by Wade Hampton III » Tue Jun 30, 2020 6:30 pm

In Wells' original novel the battle takes place off the mouth
of the River Blackwater, Essex, where Brits from London are
escaping the Martian offensive. Three Martian fighting-machines
having approached the vessels from the seaward side, HMS Thunder-
child signals to the main fleet and steams at full speed towards
the Martians without firing. The Martians, whom the narrator
suggests are unfamiliar with large warships, at first use only
a gas attack, which fails, and thereafter using their Heat-Ray,
inflicting a great amount of damage upon Thunderchild, which
brings down a fighting machine with its guns even as it succumbs
to Heat-Ray. The flaming wreckage of the torpedo-ram crashes
into a second fighting-machine, destroying it, and when the
black smoke and super heated steam banks dissipate, both the
Thunderchild and the third fighting-machine are gone.
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Thunderchild Profile
Thunderchild Profile
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The attack by Thunderchild occupies the Martians long enough
for three Royal Navy ironclads of the main Channel Fleet to arrive.
The fate of the third Martian fighting machine is not revealed by
Wells, but the battle did enable the civilian shipping to escape.
As depicted in the book, Thunderchild is the only human artifact
competing with the Martian fighting-machines on anything like equal
terms.
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Battle Begins!
Battle Begins!
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For April Fools Day 2020, amateur naval historian and YouTube
commentator Drachinifel (see here)...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQBund8uLmo

....produced a speculative history for the HMS Thunderchild,
offering what he saw as a plausible design and history for the
ship and her development based on Wells' description. Based on
the fact that the ship was described to be both larger and faster
than the Polyphemus or the similar USS Katahdin, he surmised that
the Thunderchild was most likely a modified version of the Victoria
or Trafalgar-class battleships that the Royal Navy would have
fielded during the late 1890s.
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Attack!
Attack!
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"COME ON, THUNDERCHILD!"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBTcaIweIQk

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Wade Hampton III
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Location: Pontiac, SC

Re: HMS Thunderchild!

Post by Wade Hampton III » Sun Jul 05, 2020 5:06 am

A CGI recreation of HMS Thunderchild as seen from the
steamer as she makes her escape from the Martian fighting
machines:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pb9wxcEnGOI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VQ8qJCotTg

This one not quite as good as the previous two, but
still deserves an Honorable Mention:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HczkDnQz82Q

"It was the day you came speeding towards us, with your
powerful guns pounding and blazing harder than ever,
through the waters of a thick, night time sky, you came
to our aid when there was no hope left, your cannons
screamed with war, as you exploded every machine gun,
cannon, missle launcher and everything you had in your
arsenal at the gigantic Lords of Man's end, you made the
Martians fear you and your gracious power over the five
nines of the sea, you fought hard, and heroicly, you never
gave up, it was until those demons and their molten ray of
fire began piercing your iron heart, but you didn't surrender!
You kept on fighting! And you died heroes. We shall sing, eat,
drink and celebrate in your name, we will always remember why
you was there, and what your mission was, we will always honor
you, your bravery and your pride in our hearts. We shall look
upon the stars and we will always know that you and your crew
of the valiant ship will guide us, now and forever. Farewell
to the heroes of HMS Thunderchild!
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Attachments
Farewell Thunderchild
Farewell Thunderchild
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Wade Hampton III
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Re: HMS Thunderchild!

Post by Wade Hampton III » Sat Jul 25, 2020 4:55 am

Thunderchild...featuring Liam Neeson and Alex Clare.
This is the newer version than the 1978 item featured
earlier in the thread. I accidentally stumbled onto
it while doing research on the original 1978 Thunderchild:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTF6bd1NcTA

Actually came out many years ago...around 2012 or so.
The artwork is really good:
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Farewell Thunderchild
Farewell Thunderchild
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...this one is also good...
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Valiant Heart
Valiant Heart
69878.jpg (185.51 KiB) Viewed 4470 times
...as is this one...
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Deadly Heat Ray
Deadly Heat Ray
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Not bad for a warship that exists only in the imagination!
:!: :!: :!:
Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of The Worlds -
The New Generation' ALBUM is coming on 26th November
(2012)! Featuring Liam Neeson, Gary Barlow, Joss Stone,
Maverick Sabre, Alex Clare and Ricky Wilson!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-2QMV8c1yw

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Wade Hampton III
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Re: HMS Thunderchild!

Post by Wade Hampton III » Sat Jul 25, 2020 5:16 pm

Not to waylay Thunderchild, but could not help
myself to this tidbit, also stumbled onto by chance.
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Fighting Martians In California
Fighting Martians In California
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https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0046534/
This 1953 update is a loose adaptation of the
1898 novel of the same name by H. G. Wells,
the first of five film adaptations. It is a
modern retelling of the 1897 novel, changing
the setting from Victorian era-England to 1953
southern California. Of course Thunderchild
does not appear off the coast of this large US
state, but we do see an upscale version of the
Martian fighting machines.
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Movie Poster
Movie Poster
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The fighters still posses the heat ray as well
as anti-gravity systems and propulsion. It is
also worth adding that California has indeed
been invaded, but not by Martians. This version
of "War of the Worlds" was still semi-believeable.
Even by 1953 the planet Mars was still very much
of a mystery in that little was known about this
red planet - as was the case in 1898. Another
twelve years would have to pass before Mariner IV
sailed passed Mars with hard revelations. One of
the great successes of the early Caucasian US
space program, the Mariner 4 mission journeyed
to Mars -- making its closest approach on
July 15, 1965 -- and took the first photos of
another planet from space.
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Jeff Wayne's Version
Jeff Wayne's Version
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White America could at last breath a collective
sigh of relief. There would be no invasion by
Mars with their fighting machines...both tripods
and gravity-assist. However, what to do about
the real and ongoing invaders coming across the
Southern border? That issue is still very much
with us today.

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Wade Hampton III
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Re: HMS Thunderchild!

Post by Wade Hampton III » Wed Jul 29, 2020 10:12 am

Mariner IV was quite an exceptional spacecraft.
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Mariner IV
Mariner IV
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Images of craters and measurements of a thin
atmosphere — much thinner than expected — indicating
a relatively inactive planet exposed to the harshness
of space, generally dissipated hopes of finding
intelligent life on Mars. Life on Mars had been the
subject of speculation and science fiction for centuries.
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Giant Martian Canals
Giant Martian Canals
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https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecr ... =1964-077A

Where is the Mariner IV spacecraft now? Eventually
the gas supply in the attitude control system was
exhausted - and in 1967 - a total of 83 micrometeoroid
hits were recorded which caused perturbation of the
spacecraft's attitude and degradation of the signal
strength.

On December 21, 1967, communications with Mariner 4
were terminated. The spacecraft is now derelict in
an exterior heliocentric orbit, where it remains
to this day.

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