Kerbal Raft Program

[Kerbface]

A trip to Mun has not ended as planned. After losing communication with KSC, one brave Kerbal has accidentally parachuted his capsule down hundreds of kerlometres from the intended target in the middle of the ocean on a small island. In many ways it resembles a tropical island on Earth, there are palm trees with koconuts but otherwise basically nothing edible to Kerbals. There are a variety of different types of trees and shrubery and even some reasonable strength vines (Probably not strong enough to swing from a tree branch reliably though). There is no permanent body of fresh water on the island. It's a tropical weather environment, but it's coming close to the end of the wet season.

The kerbal has only the tiniest bit of fuel left in his capsule, but still has a little bit of food and supplies left over.

Anyway, nobody knows where he is and he must get back to the KSC by himself on some kind of watercraft. Use your engineering and scientific knowledge to design a raft or other craft to get him safely home. He will need some method of propulsion, regular access to food and unsalty clean water, shelter, the ability to survive through storms, etc. This is a journey which could take weeks or more, depending on how fast your craft travels.

You can describe how your craft works and/or post a picture demonstrating it. You can only use what's available on the island. Also explain how he gets what he needs to survive.

Anyone be interested to give this a go? Just thought it would be fun, since people here obviously like designing things.

[Rockhem]

A trip to Mun has not ended as planned. After losing communication with KSC, one brave Kerbal has accidentally parachuted his capsule down hundreds of kerlometres from the intended target in the middle of the ocean on a small island. In many ways it resembles a tropical island on Earth, there are palm trees with koconuts but otherwise basically nothing edible to Kerbals. There are a variety of different types of trees and shrubery and even some reasonable strength vines (Probably not strong enough to swing from a tree branch reliably though). There is no permanent body of fresh water on the island. It's a tropical weather environment, but it's coming close to the end of the wet season.

The kerbal has only the tiniest bit of fuel left in his capsule, but still has a little bit of food and supplies left over.

Anyway, nobody knows where he is and he must get back to the KSC by himself on some kind of watercraft. Use your engineering and scientific knowledge to design a raft or other craft to get him safely home. He will need some method of propulsion, regular access to food and unsalty clean water, shelter, the ability to survive through storms, etc. This is a journey which could take weeks or more, depending on how fast your craft travels.

You can describe how your craft works and/or post a picture demonstrating it. You can only use what's available on the island. Also explain how he gets what he needs to survive.

Anyone be interested to give this a go? Just thought it would be fun, since people here obviously like designing things.

This is a nice challenge, i might try it, but it should be moved to the challenge section.

[Kerbface]

This is a nice challenge, i might try it, but it should be moved to the challenge section.

Yeah, wasn't totally sure where to put it, but I thought challenge section was for in-game contests. This is all just fun with ideas.

[Kerbface]

Nobody's interested in this?

You can use your capsule in the design if you want. It's a one person capsule and remember, it's bouyant.

[Scotius]

Well, i can build a space station, interplanetary vessel and munal lander - but make me build a cage for rabbits, and i would turn my fingers into bloody mess. I don't doubt an astronaut after survival training would be able to escape this island without difficulty, but such escapade is well above the head of average gamer.

[maackey]

Scotius: its easy to come up with ideas, and designs; implementing it is where things get tricky. And since there is no way to really replicate this IRL, ideas and designs are all we can make/share on the forums.

As for the actual challenge/thought experiment:

My (practical) engineer side says: Triangulate the last known trajectory and velocity before loss of communications to generate a tight grid to send a rescue plane for search/recovery. No need for the stranded kerbal to do much but relax on the sunny beach drinking a refreshing coconut concoction out of the shell (little tiny umbrellas are standard survival equipment, right? Right after a good knife and duct tape).

My wild, "ok, I'll bite, lets break this down" engineer side says: Ok. Jeb took off in a rocket by himself while the launch crew were sleeping. Some boosters created a structural failure smashing ship to fragments, and the luckily surviving pod just happened to land on some small, remote island.

Before he even starts thinking about building a raft, he needs to know where he is. Building a raft is less than useless without knowing where you're going. So lets assume that he does know where he is. (using the aforementioned path triangulation or gps or calculus/geometry/seasonal knowledge or whatever, but noone else does.

You didn't mention a distance, or when during flight communications were lost/SRBs exploded. This could leave him laughably close, or on the exact opposite of the planet. Maybe he paid attention in geography class and knows where KSC 2 is. Maybe there is a city somewhere nearby where he can get to a phone to get a ride back. So I'll just assume the distance is relatively close to KSC (or close to some other civilized area), because otherwise its better to just set up shop on the island.

Yet another undefined variable is the weather, and ocean currents etc. Although I'm tempted to say some form of sailboat would be the most effective and efficient (and easy to make) craft regardless. This would cover propulsion, and can be made from readily available materials. The parachute can be repurposed into a sail and cordage, the mast and a steering/emergency oar can be crafted from the local flora. The buoyant command pod, obviously, would be the hull.

Ok, propulsion is taken care of, what next?

- Propulsion

- food

- water

- shelter

- storms

Food. Nothing on the island is edible but "koconuts" so that makes things pretty straightforward. He rations his survival rations in combination with a lovely bunch of coconuts. I honestly don't know how viable fishing is with a simple hook and line in the ocean (assuming fishing hooks are in survival gear, which they should be) but I suppose its also a way to pass the time.

Water. I heard there may be some of it in the ocean. Evaporation stills are pretty easy to make, and he may be able to create a portable version to take with him depending on what kind of survival gear he has on hand. If he can only make a basic one on the island, empty coconuts can be used to store some extra water.

Shelter/Storms. Come on... you are worried about shelter when you have a comfy little living space for one that can withstand the harsh conditions of SPACE?! This is pretty self explanatory IMO.

And there are my hastily thought out ideas. Sorry if they are not particularly illuminating or creative. It is sometimes difficult to come up with scenarios which aren't very clearly defined and you have no restrictions.