1461: Payloads/Transcript

[Below is (WILL Be) the full transcript for 1461: Payloads.]

[The comic is divided in two main sections the top third of the comic being black and the bottom section white. At the very bottom is a timeline in a black section that runs like a border along the bottom. The timeline with large years noted along it as well as the large title and its subtitle in the first black section is in white. In the white section the large text of the title with its two subtitles are black. All other text, in the two main sections, is labels next to the different objects. These labels are written in red text.]

[Each object is made up from a number of horses (or fractions thereof for less than one full horse used) and in the second section also other objects are added see below. All horses are drawn with their head to the left, two legs showing and no clear tail at their end. When fractions are used the drawing start to the left so the head is always visible if a full head is needed in the fraction.]

[For each of the two main sections each label is generally listed going from bottom left and up and then right. The first objects description tells where to start, and then where the horses are compared to the text. Then the next objects description tells where the next text is compared to the previous text (so not where the horses are) and again where the horses are compared to the text belonging to them. This continues until the last item.]

[In the black section the horses are white to begin with and stacked after a set of rules. To begin with there are less than a full, but then later when there are many horses that they are divided into compartments that forms squares of five times five horses, which again, when there are more than 50 is stacked two next to each other or and then the rest on top, filling entire rows of ten over two squares. When over 100 they form four squares in a two by two format. And then two extra squares are added for every 50 extra horses, and those above 100 will then be added in columns of 10 (and if there are two full blocks on top of each other rows are added in columns of 20! This is only relevant for the ISS). This goes on all the way from left to right except for one spacecraft which is clearly the space-shuttle as the horses are stacked in the shape of the shuttle, and in the center of the shuttle (where the shuttle’s payload goes) the horses are drawn in light gray. Finally the horses in the last four groups are drawn in a dark gray shade, because they are in the future. In total there are 34 labels in the black section. Two of the space craft have two labels as there are two parts to the spacecrafts. Apart from the space-shuttle also the Cassini is spilt as the small Huygens lander is set a bit aside from the rest of the spacecraft. And finally one of the objects is a T-rex I shown in equivalent mass in horses, and it is thus not a spacecraft. This leaves 34 objects, but one is not a rocket and two are part of other spacecrafts at takeoff leaving only and 31 spacecrafts. There are 2065 full horses drawn as well as six horse fractions for spacecrafts with a mass less than a full horse which has then been given more precisely as the equivalent of the mass of 18 dogs (one of them large) and one squirrel, so five spacecraft are have their mass given in dog mass. One of these is so close to a horse mass that the horse looks full so there are 2066 full horses. Randall has not listed the number of horses for the three last spacecraft in the future, and also not for one spy satellite from the 1990s. Maybe because their mass is unknown, but the horses are there to count. The number of horses will though not be listed as part of the text transcript, but only in the description for these four.]

[Here follows the description of the black section:]

[Bottom left: Horse head with neck down to the torso below the neck, left of:]

Sputnik

<1 horse

(2 dogs )

[Above that a very tiny white dot right of:]

Vanguard 1

<1 horse

(Squirrel )

[Above and right of that a small white dot left of:]

Pioneer 5

<1 horse

(Large dog)

[Above and right of that front part of horse from head down to the front legs, left of:]

Mariner 2 (United States)

<1 horse

(3 dogs )

[Above that the first full horse with two legs shown and the end visible left of:]

Venera 1 (USSR)

1 horse

[Right of the two previous the first multiple horse spacecraft. Two squares of 25 horses five by five and then two rows above these two squares where the last five over the second square is only to horses rather than five. Below:]

Apollo

67 horses

[Above and right of that a row of three horses:]

Venera 7

3 horses

[Above and right of that what looks like a full horse:]

Pioneer 10

<1 horse

(7 dogs)

[Below and right of that the largest so far with more than 150 horses. The first four squares of 25 are arranges in a 2x2 square and have a slightly larger separation between that block and the next square to their right than there are between the blocks inside the first 100 horse block. After the next fifty placed in two blocks above each other there are two full columns and then a single horse at the bottom of a third column:]

Skylab

171 horses

[Above and right of that are two rows of five horses with a single horse below these two rows, placed under the fourth horse from the left. They are below:]

Venera 9

11 horses

[Above and right of that two horses behind each other above:]

Voyager 2

2 horses

[Below and right of that the only set of horses that are not stacked only in square blocks. The horses are clearly put up in the shape of the space-shuttle. There are still five horses in two rows next to each other at the top where it is broadest, like there would be in a spacecraft made up of for instance 50 horses. But up toward the tip from two full rows the number of horses in each row is getting one smaller both left and right twice with two rows of eight and two of six horses following the two with ten horses. Above them is the very tip of the shuttle with only two horses. Below the tips two rows with ten horses, there is a hole in the ship for where the shuttle’s payload goes. The row just below the last row of ten is missing the two central horses (so there are eight). There are no payload horses in that row. The next 11 rows of the shuttle are only two horses wide on either side of the payload. The mass of the payload is also drawn as horses in the center of the shuttle only these horses are drawn in light gray color rather than in white. The first row where the first row of only two shuttle horses on either side is only four horses wide and they have been shifted so they are centered over the next row with five horses below. That row is slightly longer down that all the white horses rows above, because this is where a separation between two blocks of 50 horses is made. Down the center of the white shuttle tip the distance between left and right rows of horses is also slightly larger making this center line appear clearly in the shuttle. But down along the two 25 horses blocks of the light gray payload horses there is no such split as these 50 horses are drawn in two five by five squares above each other, with those last 4 horses on top slightly further apart than even the distance between the two 25 horses blocks. Along the first six rows of payload there are also those four white horses in either side making these rows to rows of 9 horses (the first row of payload with four horses was thus 8 horses across but with the same total width and just more black space between shuttle and payload). Below the first row of payload horses in the bottom square the shuttle width starts to increase These extra horses are clearly further apart than any other columns because the central part of the shuttle is two squares wide (i.e. 10 horses wide) and thus the larger separation to the next squares that will form out there. The first two rows have one extra horse on either side making it three horses on either side. Then the next two rows, the last two of the payload the number of horses increases one on either side with each row so the last row with payload has five horses on either side, making the number of horses in this row 15, but with two columns of black on either side of the payload. Below the payload another square of 50 horses is finished so automatically the space between payload and the bottom section of the shuttle is large, just as it was on the top, but there the extra space was inside the payload horses. The width of the spaceship has increased once more with one horse left and right and this is the widest the shuttle becomes. The first row of horses just below the payload it also the row with most horses as there are no empty space, just the extra separation between the central “squares of 10 horses wide (including the two horses that where on either side of the payload above. So there are now six horses where above there were only five horses). And on either side of this row there are four horses for a row total of 18 horses. The row beneath this is just as wide, but the two horses that was in the two rows on either side of the payload is not missing, for a total of 14 horses in this second to last row, where there are two times three horses just below the payload section. These extending rows of horses form the wings of the shuttle. The last row only has horses under this central row, and the two horses in the center of the row above has been removed leaving the row only four horses wide and with a hole in the middle which simulates the exhaust hole for the engine. There are 160 white horses and 54 light gray for a total mass of 214 horses with the payload, so Randall has either drawn 8 horse too many (for instance the last row of the wings) or types 206 by mistake. There are two sections of text both of them to the left of the shuttle. The first next to the broadest part of the tip of the shuttle, the second next to the top full square of horses of the payload:]

Shuttle

(Total)

206 horses

Shuttle

Payload

54 horses

[Above and right of that is the first regular shaped spacecraft with a mass over 200 horses. It is even close to 300 so there are three blocks of four squares of horses, with extra space between each of these three blocks. The last block is not completely full, there are only for nine horses in the rows for except for the top two rows where there are only seven, thus only missing 12 horses from 300. The text is above the top left corner:]

Mir

288 horses

[Below and right of that is the only non-spacecraft included (for comparison). There are three rows of 5 horses to the left of:]

T-Rex

15 horses

[A bit down and right of that is a full square of 25 horses above:]

Hubble

25 horses

[Slightly above and right of that another square but with two full rows above and three horses on top of these. The text is below:]

Compton

Gamma Ray

Observatory

38 horses

[Above and right of that another full square but with the next squares three column to the right not above. The mass is 40 horses, but that is for some reason not given in the text below:]

Keyhole 3/font>

Spy satellite

[Below at the very bottom and right of that the largest of any item in the hole chart. There are eight full two by two squares (of 100 each) stacked in two rows of four. Two more blocks of four squares are begun at the right end, but only the first six columns are filled up to the full height of 20 horses. The seventh and last row in the space craft is only 12 horses high from the bottom. Thus more than three full rows miss before another full block would have been added. The text is below at the bottom left corner:]

International Space Station

932 horses

[The next four spacecrafts are above the ISS but only the first of these here has the text almost exactly above that. There are three columns pf four horses, but the last horse at the bottom right is set apart from the other 11 by shifting it slightly both down and right. There are two sections of text both of them to the right of the horses. The first is at the top right tip and the second next to the offset horse:]

Cassini

11 horses

Huygens lander

1 horse

[Right of that is a row of five horses with a sixth horse above the first horse in the row. The text is below:]

Rosetta

6 horses

[Right of that a bit more than half a horse from the head to the middle of the body halfway between the legs. Text to the right:]

Opportunity

<1 horse

(5 dogs)

[Right of that (the last over the ISS) are three horses in a row above:]

Dawn

3 horses

[Below and right of that (just right of the top end of the ISS) are three rows of five horses above:]

Terrastar

15 horses

[Below and right of that three rows of five horses with two more on top of these above:]

Dragon

17 horses

[Above and right of that three rows of five horses with four more on top of these above:]

Tiangong-1

19 horses

[Above and a bit left of that two horses above:]

Curiosity

2 horses

[Below at the bottom and right of that a full square and right of that three rows in the next square above:]

Keyhole 7

40 horses

[Above and right of that are four rows of five horses above:]

Orion (capsule)

20 horses

[After the longest empty space but still below and far right of that is the first spacecraft planned for the future. The horses from here on are gray rather than white. There are two rows of five and four horses above them above:]

James Webb

Telescope

14 horses

[Below and right of that four columns of five horses – 20 in total. These last three does not have their weight written in the text which is below:]

Orion

[Below and right of that is a full square of five by five horses for 25 in total to the left of:]

Orion

Service

Module

[Above and right of that are the last spacecraft (and largest from the future) with two full squares next to each other and then three columns more of five horses to their right for a total of 65 horses:]

Orion

Deep-

Space

Habitat

[In the white section the horses (and other part of the rockets depicted here) are black to begin with. They are again stacked in squares of columns of five horses in each column, if there are more than five horses. When there are more than 25 horses a five by five square will again be used, and for more than 100 it will again be four squares of 25 in a two by two stack. Here in this section, however, further horses will be stacked on top of each other to form a high column never more than two squares wide. On top of these columns there will be inserted the tip of the rocket (vehicle) not formed by horses. When the top row (or column) is not filled out, the tip is either deeper where there is no horses in the top row, or longer down if there is not enough horses in the right column. So there will not be a "hole" in the rocket where there are no horses (like there was inside the space-shuttle around its payload). Below the bottom row of horses in a rocket there are slim rectangles below which there is a rocket engine (or more) from which exhaust flame(s) will be emanating. For the smallest rockets up to all rockets with less than 100 horses there is just one engine and one flame. For rockets with two columns of 25 squares (and thus more than 100 horses), there will be at least two engines shown and from all but two of the six relevant rockets there will be shown three rather than just two flames (which is the case in one of the other two). This indicates that those rockets with three flames must have at least three engines, one of which is behind the two in front, and in the middle between them, so the three flames are seen next to each other. This back engine can in principle be seen as there is a line between the bottoms of the two engines in front, where there else should have been no line. The three engines must thus form a triangle seen from below, as opposed to the one with only two engines that must be next to each other. It is the first of those rockets set in the future to the right in the section which only has two engines and two flames. Those last five rockets set in the future and are all drawn in gray, both the horses, the tip, engine and flames. The last and different of these six large rockets is drawn so low compared to the black time-line section below that most of the bottom of its engines are not visible, and there is thus not flames visible either. That there is something special about this rocket is made clear as both the horses and the tip and engines are drawn in very light gray color. There is also one item that is not a rocket but a car. This car goes horizontally where almost all the rockets are drawn vertical except for two small ones that are also flying horizontally further to the right than the car. This leaves 46 objects, but one is not a rocket but a car. There are 1950 full horses drawn as well as six horse fractions for rocket with a mass less than a full horse which has then been given more precisely as the equivalent of the mass of 20 dogs. In all cases these fractions of horses are still (as opposed to in the black section) not drawn as fractions but as full horses so there are 1956 horses drawn. Four of these are though used in the car, so the rockets have 1952 horses for 45 rockets. There is also one Pegasus and eight centaurs among the 1952 horses, but they are not drawn differently than all the other horses. Randall has not listed the number of horses for one of the rockets in the 2000s but that seems to be because he has forgotten to put on the label (those horses have been counted here above). The number of horses will thus not be listed as part of the text transcript, but only in the description for this forgotten rocket.]

[Here follows the description of the white section:]

[Above and right of that:]

Sputnik Launcher

1 horse

[Above and right of that:]

Thor

<1 horse

(3 dogs)

[Above and right of that:]

Mercury-Atlas

3 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Saturn I

20 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Proton-K</font>

44 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Atlas-Centaur</font>

8 centaurs

[Above and right of that:]Titan IIIA

7 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Saturn IB</font>

45 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Soyuz</font>

14 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Saturn V</font>

262 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Black Arrow</font>

<1 horse

(4 dogs)

[Above and right of that:]

N1</font>

211 horse

[Above and right of that:]

Long March 1</font>

2 horses

[Above and right of that:]

N-I</font>

4 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Delta 0900</font>

3 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Ariane 1</font>

3 horses

[Above and right of that:]

SLV</font>

<1 horse

(1 dog)

[Above and right of that:]

N-II</font>

4 horses

[Above and right of that:]

1981 Oldsmobile</font>

4 horses

[Above and right of that:]

ASLV</font>

<1 horse

(4 dogs)

[Above and right of that:]

Long March 4A</font>

9 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Ariane 4</font>

16 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Shavit</font>

<1 horse

(6 dogs)

[Above and right of that:]

Energia</font>

218 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Pegasus</font>

1 pegasus

[Above and right of that:]

Atlas I

13 horses

[Above and right of that:]

PSLV</font>

8 horses

[Above and right of that:]

J-I</font>

2 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Long March 3B</font>

27 horses

[Above and right of that:]

H-IIA</font>

22 horses

[Above and right of that:]

(unlabelled)</font>

21 horse

[Above and right of that:]

Delta IV-H</font>

64 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Falcon 1</font>

1 horse

[Above and right of that:]

Ariane 5ES</font>

47 horses

[Above and right of that:]

H-IIB</font>

37 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Unha</font>

<1 horse

(2 dogs)

[Above and right of that:]

Atlas V 541</font>

38 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Falcon 9</font>

29 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Antares</font>

14 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Stratolaunch</font>

14 horses

[Above and right of that:]

Falcon Heavy</font>

118 horses

[Above and right of that:]

SLS Block 1</font>

156 horses

[Above and right of that:]

SLS Block 1B</font>

217 horses

[Above and right of that:]

SLS Block 2</font>

289 horses

[At the bottom is the second black section which is just a thin border, but on this is a time-line in white with white labels. The line has six divisions ticks and before the first of these tick to the left of where the line begins, between each set of ticks where the line is also broken, and after the line ends to the right there is a year range given or other label at the end:]

1950s

1960s

1970s

1980s

1990s

2000s

Future

[Now go read (or write) the full transcript for the large version of the comic.]