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Accretionary Arc
The late Triassic rifting was caused by a dinosaur trying to use the control panel to escape a predator, but it was eaten before the continent could fully separate.
Title text: The late Triassic rifting was caused by a dinosaur trying to use the control panel to escape a predator, but it was eaten before the continent could fully separate.

    Explanation

    This comic describes Cueball and Ponytail escaping from a mob of angry people. The reason for the mob is unclear, but it is led by Black Hat, so they are likely caught up in one of his nefarious schemes. However, Ponytail remembers that the land they are now on used to be an island, which attached to North America, and uses a control panel, possibly referencing the universal control panel in reverse to split off that part of the continent. The pursuers are left behind and either do not have ranged weapons (Black Hat has a spear, followed by others with a sword, an axe, and a halberd), do not wish to use them or else did not get in range to practically use them in time, and are left shouting across the water now separating them from Cueball and Ponytail.

    The "island arc" refers to the Taconic orogeny, when approximately 550 through 440 million years ago the Bronson Hill Arc island chain consisting of modern-day New England and Eastern Canada collided with the rest of modern-day North America, forming parts of the modern Piedmont region of the Appalachian Mountains.

    In reality, control panels for continental drift do not exist, both in the past and present.[citation needed] Merely reversing the direction of drift would also be unhelpful: continental drift is so slow that it was unknown for most of human history. Speeding drift up by a factor of 1000 would result in a movement of inches per *day*. Using a factor of one million would result in movement slower than walking speed. This might be enough to escape. The mob leader is 120 to 150 feet behind Cueball (about 21 times the leader's height), and the panel needs to open a discouraging rift before that distance is crossed (at least 5 feet if the mob is surprised and misses the chance to make a running jump). Generously assuming that the mob is tired and slowed by their bulky weapons, the distance takes at most 30 seconds (an athlete might cross several times faster). The slowest speed of travel that might possibly escape is 0.1 miles per hour, though this would only stop a comically slow, incompetent and unlucky mob. Faster pursuit, delays operating the panel, and having the rift boundary located anywhere other than directly behind Cueball would require 1 mile per hour or faster for a close call.

    The map indicates that "full reverse" is dramatically faster. Rather than creating a small chasm, the final panel shows the arc nearly 300 miles to the east (the northeastern coast having shifted by roughly the width of the state of New York). If this were to happen in the minute that it might take for the mob to realize the situation and shout in frustration, then the arc would have transferred so fast that the escapees would have been dropped into the now-ocean. The rift might not even have had time to fill with water, unless the pursuit took place next to a large body of water, in which case swimming might have been a more reliable way to flee. The panel may protect matter on the surface of the moving landmass from negative effects of such acceleration.

    The title text's "late Triassic rifting" refers to the South Georgia rift, where a rift valley formed along the southeastern United States during the late Triassic approximately 215 through 175 million years ago, but failed to separate the continent before the plate tectonics causing the rifting shifted, ending the rift (but leaving the geological history). The title text claims that this was due to a dinosaur attempting to use the control panel in a similar fashion, but the rift ended because it was eaten before completing the task like Cueball and Ponytail did. This confirms that the panel was able to make major landmass changes in a short time, with the only question being whether the predator ended up on the right side of the rift.

    See also 2577, in which a similarly impractical device is used for an escape.

    Transcript

    [Cueball and Ponytail are running to the right.]
    Cueball: They're right behind us!
    Ponytail: It's OK! I have a plan.
    [The field of view widens, showing an angry horde of people with weapons (consisting of Black Hat waving a spear, in the lead, two Cueballs behind him, waving an axe and a sword, and a fourth figure which is obscured) chasing Cueball and Ponytail, who in turn are running towards a control panel.]
    Ponytail: This part of the continent used to be an island arc before it collided with North America.
    [Close up on Cueball and Ponytail. Cueball looks back to the left, toward the mob while Ponytail pushes buttons on a control panel about waist-high which has some dirt and plants covering it.]
    Ponytail: I just gotta access the control panel...
    Ponytail: Yes! It still works!
    Ponytail: OK, full reverse!
    Control panel: Beep beep
    [The field of view widens again, showing North America with a serrated edge along the east coast, from around the state of New Jersey to the province of New Brunswick. A landmass, whose shape indicates that it approximately includes Long Island, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, parts of New Hampshire, Maine, and New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia, is moving off to the east in the Atlantic Ocean. The voice of the mob comes from the east coast of North America and the voice of Ponytail comes from the west coast of the landmass.]
    Angry mob: No!
    Ponytail: Hah!

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