# So, why didn't the Death Star just blow up Yavin? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 18, 2011, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709 "2011-09-18T12:22:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/21 "2011-09-18T17:41:57Z")
> [@appleciders](#): > > I imagine that an explosion big enough to blow up Yavin would blow up both Endor and the Death star. Doubtful - Endor was on the other side of the galaxy. ---
**Author:** ![appleciders](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@appleciders](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/appleciders)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/22 "2011-09-18T18:16:49Z")
> [@cochrane](#): > > Wait. We are talking “A New Hope” here, aren’t we, and not “Return of the Jedi?” Endor is light years away from Yavin. The rebels in “A New Hope” are based on Yavin’s fourth moon. > [@diku](#): > > Yeah, I’m talking about Yavin and the fourth moon. They’re like 20 feet apart. If Yavin blows up bad things are going to happen to that moon. Hell, if it’s a gas giant, shoot through it! > [@Munch](#): > > Doubtful - Endor was on the other side of the galaxy. I’m mixing my Death Stars here. Regardless, blowing up Yavin would presumably destroy both the moon with the rebel base and the Death Star; after all, both the Death Star and the moon are in orbit around Yavin. It’s been a couple years since I’ve seen it, but what I recall is that the Death Star needs to wait until the fourth moon appears over Yavin’s horizon. That implies that both the Death Star and the moon are not that far away from Yavin, and blowing up the planet would deal comparable damage to the Death Star. ---
**Author:** ![Death\_of\_Rats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a6a055/32.png) [@Death\_of\_Rats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Death_of_Rats)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/23 "2011-09-18T18:30:56Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > That would also explain why they didn’t shoot the escape pod when there were no life forms on board. “Oh, so we are rationing laser bolts now?” “Do \*you \*do the budget, Terry? Do you?” ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Q](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/898d66/32.png) [@Johnny\_Q](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Q)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/24 "2011-09-18T20:26:10Z")
> [@drastic\_quench](#): > > Pride. In the game of planetary sharp shooting, \*\*Yavin is a broad side of a barn, \*\*while it’s moon - comparatively - is much more in womp rat territory. And we al know how Imperial Marksmen stand up to the broad side of a barn. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/25 "2011-09-18T21:10:36Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > I’ll go with the gas giant thing. Assuming they built the Death Star to be able to destroy inhabited planets there would be no reason to make it powerful enough to disrupt a gas giant. > > Also, we don’t have a direct movie canon description of how long recharge takes. As for the Death Star II, it fired a lot of shots, but those can’t have been full power blasts. I would have to assume that they turned the superlaser down to minimum setting to one-shot those Mon Calamari cruisers. It wasn’t just made to destroy inhabited planets; it was made to destroy shielded inhabited planets that could withstand fleets of Star Destroyers; and as we saw with Alderaan, it had plenty of overkill even for that. I’d expect the result when it hit a gas giant to be pretty impressive. But in their eyes they just had no reason to hurry. As for the Death Star II, it was much larger and more powerful; it had a much faster recharge time. Probably at least in part to ensure that the Yavin situation didn’t reoccur. ---
**Author:** ![chrisk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@chrisk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chrisk)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/26 "2011-09-18T21:40:51Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > It wasn’t just made to destroy inhabited planets; it was made to destroy shielded inhabited planets that could withstand fleets of Star Destroyers; and as we saw with Alderaan, it had plenty of overkill even for that. I’d expect the result when it hit a gas giant to be pretty impressive. Come on, how much of the force of an energy blast like that do you really think planet-wide shields can absorb or deflect? Maybe Alderaan took twice or three times as much energy to explode as an uninhabited and undefended planet of the same mass. Jupiter is 317.8 times the mass of the Earth. There is that much more matter within in that can absorb energy, and also a correspondingly steeper gravity well for any of it to fly out of if you want an actually explosive effect. And unlike with a rocky world, there wouldn’t be much of a noticeable tactical effect if you COULDN’T explode it - even if you raised the temperature of all the atmospheric layers, that wouldn’t hurt the moon, and it wouldn’t let you fly the Death Star through the place where Yavin was, because it’s still there. I’d go so far as saying that there might be one kind of impressive result if the Death Star shot at Yavin - a localized gas eruption, something a bit like a solar flare except not from a sun. However, that would shoot out from the side of the planet where it was struck, and therefore would be more of a danger to the Death Star itself than to Yavin 4, if the Death Star wasn’t already in range for a direct shot. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/27 "2011-09-18T21:43:23Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > Another thing I just thought of, the beam at full strength, might cost the equivalent of a trillion dollars to fire. Maybe Tarkin wanted to come in under budget. “What do we get paid by the laser!?” ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/28 "2011-09-18T21:47:19Z")
I love how people try to apply science to Star Wars. Just push that rock up the hill one more time, guys. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/29 "2011-09-18T21:47:53Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > 24 hours, which is why they didn’t do it. The Death Star 2 recharged much faster. > > Hyperdrives for travel between stars. I don’t know how it traveled STL, given that Star Wars ships normally have really obvious engines. Star Wars ships have those big main engines for main STL thrust, but they meneuver and hover using invisible “repulsorlift” technology. I suspect the Death Star mostly just hyperdrives into orbit and lets gravity do the rest though. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/30 "2011-09-18T21:56:27Z")
> [@chrisk](#): > > Come on, how much of the force of an energy blast like that do you really think planet-wide shields can absorb or deflect? Maybe Alderaan took twice or three times as much energy to explode as an uninhabited and undefended planet of the same mass. It didn’t just “explode”, it exploded violent and dramatically with far more force than necessary to destroy it. So yes, I thing the result when hitting a gas giant would be spectacular and probably fatal for anything near in astronomical terms. > [@chrisk](#): > > Jupiter is 317.8 times the mass of the Earth. There is that much more matter within in that can absorb energy, and also a correspondingly steeper gravity well for any of it to fly out of if you want an actually explosive effect. And unlike with a rocky world, there wouldn’t be much of a noticeable tactical effect if you COULDN’T explode it - even if you raised the temperature of all the atmospheric layers, that wouldn’t hurt the moon, and it wouldn’t let you fly the Death Star through the place where Yavin was, because it’s still there. As I recall, the calculations for how powerful the beam must be to blow up a terrestrial planet like Alderaan so violently imply that you’d be putting more energy into the planet than the Sun’s total output. So I expect it would flare bright enough to boil off the surface of a moon orbiting it, at the very least. It might well go up like a gigantic fusion bomb. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2011, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/31 "2011-09-18T23:42:34Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > It didn’t just “explode”, it exploded violent and dramatically with far more force than necessary to destroy it. So yes, I thing the result when hitting a gas giant would be spectacular and probably fatal for anything near in astronomical terms. > > As I recall, the calculations for how powerful the beam must be to blow up a terrestrial planet like Alderaan so violently imply that you’d be putting more energy into the planet than the Sun’s total output. So I expect it would flare bright enough to boil off the surface of a moon orbiting it, at the very least. It might well go up like a gigantic fusion bomb. All these worlds are yours, except Yavin IV? ---
**Author:** ![dzeiger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/46a35a/32.png) [@dzeiger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dzeiger)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2011, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/32 "2011-09-19T00:36:33Z")
> [@Finagle](#): > > Although I guess another question would be, “Why didn’t the Death Star come out of hyperspace in a better position to blow the moon into dust? Or just pop into hyperspace for a couple of milliseconds. Who was piloting that thing?” Well, we have other case history to suggest that “Knowing where best to come out of hyperspace” is not considered a critical part of Imperial Officer training. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2011, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/33 "2011-09-19T02:00:38Z")
Paperwork. There are a shitload of reports and environmental impact statements to file if you destroy a planet. But a moon can be destroyed without any of that bother. ---
**Author:** ![Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/intergalactic_gladiator/32/112_2.png) [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intergalactic_Gladiator)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2011, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/34 "2011-09-19T02:23:22Z")
> [@Finagle](#): > > What was their hurry? As far as they knew, the rebels didn’t have anything that could touch a Death Star. The best they could do was launch a mildly annoying swarm of fighters. > > Although I guess another question would be, “Why didn’t the Death Star come out of hyperspace in a better position to blow the moon into dust? Or just pop into hyperspace for a couple of milliseconds. Who was piloting that thing?” Flying through hyperspace isn’t like dusting crops, boy. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2011, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/35 "2011-09-19T04:24:06Z")
> [@Johnny\_Q](#): > > And we al know how Imperial Marksmen stand up to the broad side of a barn. > [@Obi-Wan Kenobi](#): > > Only Imperial Stormtroopers are so precise. Best quote of the movie, considering the Stormtroopers’ lack of ability to shoot Han, Luke, Leia, or Chewie. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2011, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/36 "2011-09-19T04:50:59Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > Best quote of the movie, considering the Stormtroopers’ lack of ability to shoot Han, Luke, Leia, or Chewie. 😃 Makes you wonder how incompetent the sand people must be. I figure they must be batting about 50/50 when it comes to holding the right end of the blaster pistol. ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2011, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/37 "2011-09-19T14:43:34Z")
Tarkin was all about directness. He wanted to shoot the enemy in the face, rather than shoot them in the leg and wait for them to die. ---
**Author:** ![tanstaafl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ba8739/32.png) [@tanstaafl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tanstaafl)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2011, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/38 "2011-09-19T15:46:11Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > Best quote of the movie, considering the Stormtroopers’ lack of ability to shoot Han, Luke, Leia, or Chewie. 😃 Actually, this almost makes sense… [The biggest Star Wars plot hole, explained by science](http://www.cracked.com/article_18858_the-biggest-star-wars-plot-hole-explained-by-science.html) ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2011, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/39 "2011-09-19T15:58:41Z")
> [@diku](#): > > Seriously? As soon as the guy says 30 minutes to rebel base, Tarkin should say “Wait, let’s back up and jut blow up the big GIANT planet in front of the moon.”. I think that would’ve been quicker. > > Watching my blu rays too early on a Sunday. Don’t worry. It’ll be fixed in the 3D Blu-Ray release. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2011, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709/40 "2011-09-19T16:14:27Z")
For a better fanwank, it’s quite plausible that merely shooting the gas giant wouldn’t do enough immediate damage to keep the rebels from a potential escape. They’ve shown that given enough time, they can put together an evacuation. So destroying the gas giant doesn’t simply need to sometime-eventually destroy Yavin, but do so fast enough that the rebels didn’t engineer another last-minute escape. It does make sense that they’d want to be absolutely sure this time. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-why-didnt-the-death-star-just-blow-up-yavin/596709.md?page=3)