After donating Tritium to the stuck FC Enterprise I asked the Navigator of the Shadow Head to plot a course towards the top of the galaxy. I, myself, was constantly talking to the pilots of the numerous guests on board of the Shadow Head, who explored the systems we came through. No-one should have left behind and the schedule of jump orders to the carrier were given, when all commanders were confident to be able to dock before preflight lockdown.

Commander Seiling docking her T10 at Shadow Head

As well I was talking to commander Seiling, who was on her way towards the ceiling since a while. While checking the plotted routes I saw her fleet carrier not to far away. Seiling had loaded sufficient Tritium on board her carrier to make the way up to the top and back towards the bubble but the margins in my point of view were tight.

I met commander Seiling in November during the rescue of commander Rodnerg some 7kly out of the bubble and visited her carrier parked only a few jumps away from the target system of that operation then. Commander Seiling is an interesting commander, member of the Fleet Carrier Owners Club (FCO) but seemingly following her own paths, which I like a lot. It occurs to me she slowly moves her carrier to locations she is interested in refilling Tritium mined from systems along her route, slowly but constantly moving the carrier.

Opportunities to transfer Tritium and make explorers dock

I offered commander Seiling some Tritium since the Shadow Head still had sufficient amounts of Tritium stored and we agreed to meet in HD 107742 to transfer a good amount to enlarge commader Seilings radius of operation.

Turned out commander Seiling used a T10 to manage the Tritium transfer and I made some nice photos of the operation before finally the Shadow Head was resuming its journey towards the top. I have to state as well: the neighbouring galaxies become very luminous and sharp if seen from the systems close to the ceiling of the ED Milky Way, which can be seen in the next image: at the bottom left Andromeda is clearly visible.

The following image shows the CMDR’s T10 leaving after the final transfer

To reach a specific system high above the galactic plain is not an easy task. Even for a fleet carrier it is challenging. To reach HIP 63425 where the Enterprise was awaiting the delivery of Tritium involved a detour of two carrier jumps from the direct course from Fuelum to the top system. To get back on the direct route needed one more carrier jump. In total there were three additional carrier jumps necessary to do the job.

First approach to the USS Enterprise orbiting HIP 63425 on 31st January 3307, first of several Cutter loads about to be delivered: There she was in all her glory.

At 21:45hrs (UTC) the first goal of the mission was met: Using the Cutter Adelheid-Adele carried the first load of Tritium saving fleet carrier V0H-84X. For the next few deliveries the commander of the Enterprise was asked to put up a buy order for a pricing at their discretion. The Enterprise’s owner bought for prices ranging from 30k to 55k during the various runs, which seemed ok. But they were not able to buy the last carrier load saying they’d run out of credits. I do hope they have sufficient credits left to run the carrier and stay in-game. Since the owner of the Enterprise is residing on a different platform Aldarion has very limited chances to really find or help out further on. However, the carrier Enterprise was saved and the carrier management is able to sell Tritium reserves making a profit when back at the Core Systems / bubble.

Some of the pilots travelling with the Shadow Head not only explored the system but also visited the Enterprise. So far Aldarion did not hear anything from the FC owner and what they experienced during the time following the successful rescue but hey, just let me know via the Fuel Rat Internet Relay Chat, if you want.

This Sunday morning Aldarion fired up his systems on board Honest Tuck, when checking the news stream on the communication channels.

There was a commander claiming their fleet carrier were out of Tritium in HIP 63425 and they couldn’t find anyone being willing or able to fill the depot of the USS Enterprise. Aldarion answered this commander he would refill his Tritium Depot asap. It should be mentioned that the target system is located on one of the routes towards the system at the top of the ED Milky Way and it can be reached by the use of a fleet carrier only.

This image shows Aldarion and Lord Ostrik docking at the Shadow Head in orbit around Fuelum A 4 before the first FC jump towards the USS Enterprise.

Even though the Tritium Unit Manager of the Shadow Head reported a sufficient capacity of Tritium in depot and storage to reach the stranded carrier, to donate the requested 100 or 200 tons of Tritium and to move the Shadow Head to the top system further on while being able to return to the bubble safely, Aldarion decided to top up the Tritium reserves of his carrier, the Shadow Head, before starting out. Aldarion intended (and finally did) to supply as much Tritium to the stuck carrier as possible and to enable it to reach the top system on a direct route and to return also. The chance to get up to the ceiling seemed very compelling.

Nice screenshot of the Shadow Head by Commander Maake somewhere en route towards the ceiling:

Via #fuelrats/#ratchat Aldarion organized the rescue with the stranded FC owner, letting him know he needed a few hours to prepare for the operation. Several people started asking about his plans and wished to join the Shadow Head for the trip. As well Aldarion asked Commander Rodnerg, if he wanted to see the entire galaxy from its top. Rodnerg agreed. Then, commander LordOstrik was one of the first pilots eager to join for the trip. As first way point for the Shadow Head Fuelum was chosen to make the docking for every rodent willing to join as easy as possible; several commanders transferred additional vessels from Wollheim Vision to the Shadow Head too.

Lord Ostrik wasn’t sure if he should join due to heat problems he suffered from: for the whole Saturday he tried to manage a severe heat problem with his vessel but was not able to solve it. Thus Aldarion and CMDR Lord Ostrik started to analyse the problem talking via the on-board communication systems. It took 30 to 40 minutes to find a solution and Ostrik’s vessel, which was running at its maximum heat level before, could be made to operate at acceptable heat levels, finally. The following image shows the heat measurements Aldarion took during the repairs: some software tweaks in the module management system of the vessel were sufficient to result in a temporary workaround.

Once the described heat problems were solved, Aldarion was hauling Tritium from Eleumo: TFRM had over 3k tons in store there, which was more than Aldarion did gather from a number of stations before alltogether.

Fellow commanders, like commander Aspirant King, the commanders Menchi, theBumbleBee, roubleDianBow, E4E, CappeDiem, Maake, Rodnerg and many more were docking at the Shadow Head; the following image shows Aspirant King’s orange painted ASP Explorer inside one of the carrier’s docks:

During the flights to and from Eleumo more and more fellow commanders reported to join the Shadow Head for the planned trip. Commander E4E (aka E4Eler) and a number of other pilots carried several hundred tons of Tritium; the Store Management of the Shadow Head was asked to issue a buy order for Tritium at or slightly above the galactic average price. Thus the store became quickly filled with a good quantity of Tritium and all preparations seemed to be on a good way. Later it turned out the were no more limpets available at the Shadow Head, which Aldarion was not thinking about at the given moment.

Finally the Shadow Head was on Stand-By awaiting to start into the rescue mission; Plenty commanders were given time to dock and to transfer their vessels before the first jump order finally could be issued to the Shadow Head: the journey to the top – including a FC rescue – had begun.

The following image was contributed by CMDR Cappe Diem showing his Anaconda above the galaxy:

Commander Cappe Diem used the day to display the difference of the Milky Way, the edge and the Blackness of the void - I guess it needed some aiming to get this shot due to the fact the neighbouring dwarf galaxies of the Milky Way can't be seen.

Due to the minimal number of possible routes towards the top system of the ED Milky Way it is not too unlikely to find more than one carrier in one of the bottleneck systems:

The intense light of the bulge of the Milky Way in concurrency with an orange star (image by commander Cappe Diem):

The only chance to travel to the next system out here is to dock at a fleet carrier before pre flight lockdown:

Some more screenshots of the Shadow Head, CMDR's Cappe Diem's Anaconda, the marvels above the galactic plain and a rescue trip on the last day of January 3307, which became a lot of fun (images provided by CMDR Cappe Diem):

Commander E4E brought a Lakon T9 with him; the huge hauler provided the operation with nearly enough Tritium to reach the target system HIP 63425, where the USS Enterprise was awaiting its re-supplies. The T9 is one, if not the favourite ship of Aldarion. Once the stuck fleet carrier was replenished, the journey towards the top was continued.

Commander E4 also managed to get some photos of other commanders docking at the Shadow Head:

Commander Menchi provided a nice photo of his vessel in front of an orange ball of fire:

The intensity of the full star field causes high contrasts at the edges of the spiral galaxy.

Commander Make enjoys the beauty of the full picture from his Krait Phantom and contributed the following image:

Commander roubleDainBow brought a Sidewinder with him. Thus he was able to take some interesting shots of the jumping Shadow Head, then selfdestructing the Sidey to return on board of the fleetcarrier inside the target system.

Shadow Head entering Hyperspace on her way towards the ceiling:

Fellow commander theBumbleBee brought a Krait Phantom with him and joined the tour to the ceiling of the ED Milky Way.

Commander theBumbleBee's Krait phantom seems to bask into the main star's light while awaiting the next FC jump of the Shadow Head en route to the top.