An escape pod is a capsule or craft used to escape a vessel in an emergency, usually only big enough for one person. An escape ship is larger, more complete craft also used for the same purpose. Escape pods are usually seen in science fiction, but have been used in real life to escape from supersonic aircraft. Science fiction is a form of speculative fiction principally dealing with the impact of imagined science and technology, or both, upon society and persons as individuals. ...

Famous escape ships/pods include:

Non-fiction

• The B-58 Hustler, F-111 Aardvark and B-1A Lancer all used enclosed escape crew capsules because they were intended to fly too high or too fast for safe use of conventional ejection seats.
• Some Soviet submarines like the Oscar class are rumored to have escape capsules for the crew. (The sinking of the Kursk in 2000 makes this doubtful). However, the Typhoon class Ballistic Missile submarine is also rumoured to have escape pods located near or about the sail. Evidence for this can be found in a German Documentary on the Typhoon class submarine, "Sewerstal" .

• The documentary can be downloaded or viewed at:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4891097475505544351 The Convair B-58 Hustler was a American high-speed jet bomber capable of Mach 2 supersonic flight. ... A U.S. Air Force F-111 The General Dynamics F-111 Aardvark (the nickname was unofficial for most of its lifespan, but it was officially named Aardvark at its retirement ceremony for the United States Air Force) is a long-range strategic bomber, reconnaissance, and tactical strike aircraft. ... The B-1 Lancer is an American strategic bomber with variable geometry wings. ... An escape crew capsule allows a pilot (or astronaut) to eject from his or her craft and still be protected at extreme speeds and altitudes which might not be survivable in a simple ejection seat. ... US Air Force F-15 Eagle ejection seat test using a mannequin. ... Oscar class submarine The Soviet Union’s Project 949 (Granit) and Project 949A (Antey) submarines are known in the West by their NATO reporting names: the Oscar-I and Oscar-II classes respectively. ... K-141 Kursk was a Russian nuclear cruise missile submarine which was lost with all hands when it sank in the Barents Sea on August 12, 2000. ... // The Typhoon class submarine is a type of nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine deployed by the Soviet Navy in the 1980s. ... Diagram of V-2, the first ballistic missile. ...

http://rapidshare.com/files/1430969/typhoonsmall.avi.html

Fictional uses

• Air Force One film:

In the movie, President Marshall (Harrison Ford) is taken by Secret Service officers to an escape pod inside Air Force One, but he launches it only as a decoy and remains hidden inside the plane. The pod is based on the Command Module of the Apollo spacecraft.

• Escape from New York film:

The President of the United States escapes Air Force One in an escape pod and lands inside the New York City prison.

Despite there being at least two movies and one computer game featuring Air Force One with an escape pod, the aircraft does not officially carry one.

• Allegiance computer game:

Players can eject from ships if they are destroyed.

• Alien film series:

At the end of the first film, Ellen Ripley attempts to kill the Alien by blowing up the Nostromo and escaping in the ship's lifeboat Narcissus. The pod, with Ripley and Jones the cat aboard, is recovered some 57 years later at the start of Aliens.

At the beginning of Alien³ the hibernating bodies of Ripley, Hicks, Newt, and Bishop, are automatically ejected to safety in an emergency escape vehicle when aliens loose aboard the ship cause a fire. The vehicle crash lands on a nearby prison planet, killing Hicks and Newt.

• EVE Online online game:

All ships in EVE Online carry one-man capsules that essentially are the ship's cockpit for the hard-wired pilots. These capsules are automatically ejected upon hull breach, functioning as escape pods complete with built-in life support and faster-than-light propulsion.

• Halo: Combat Evolved computer game:

At the beginning of the game the protagonist, "Master Chief", abandons the Pillar of Autumn warship and lands on the Halo in an escape pod, which is referred to as a lifepod.

• Perfect Dark computer game:

As one of the mission objectives in the level "Air Force One: Anti-Terrorism", Joanna Dark has to escort the President of the United States to an escape pod. In the next mission, after the plane has crash landed, Joanna has to find the pod and activate a distress beacon before rescuing the President from his captors.

• Planetfall interactive fiction game:

Not long after the beginning of the game the player has to enter an escape pod before the ship they are on explodes. The escape pod lands on a nearby planet, and the player has to rest in the safety webbing so that they can survive the landing.

• Serenity film:

During the Alliance-Reaver space battle, the Alliance Operative abandons his crumbling warship in a bridge escape pod.

• The Simpsons TV show:

Mr Burns uses an escape pod to flee his nuclear power plant, which is undergoing a meltdown thanks to the incompetence of Homer Simpson. His assistant Waylon Smithers makes a vain attempt to gain access, protesting "For the love of God, sir, there are two seats!", to which Burns replies, "I like to put my feet up."

• Spaceballs film:

The main antagonist starship Spaceball One features escape pods. Mel Brooks' character, President Skroob, runs for one pod, but a circus bear beats him to it, and declines to vacate it.

• Star Trek TV show:

In the pilot of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, a flashback to the Battle of Wolf 359 depicts Commander Benjamin Sisko and Jake Sisko escaping the doomed USS Saratoga in an escape pod.

In Star Trek: First Contact, Captain Picard decides to defeat the Borg that have assimilated the USS Enterprise, by using the ship's self-destruct mechanism. The crew escape beforehand by means of numerous small escape pods.

In the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "The Changing Face of Evil," during the Second Battle of Chin'toka, the crew of the USS Defiant used escape pods to evacuate when their ship was completely disabled by a Breen power draining weapon.

Escape pods are also used (but rarely seen) in a few episodes of Star Trek: Voyager when shipboard crises forced the crew to flee the eponymous vessel. Often the crew were able to return to the ship once the danger had passed.

In the Star Trek: Enterprise episode "In a Mirror, Darkly," escape pods are used by the crew of the mirror universe ISS Enterprise to escape a Tholian Web. Several of the escape pods are destroyed by impacting the "threads" of the web before Enterprise itself is destroyed by the contracting energy structure.

• Star Wars film series:

In Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith General Grievous abandons his Trade Federation cruiser above Coruscant using an escape pod, and jettisons the other escape pods as to prevent the escape of Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi from the stricken vessel.

Near the beginning of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope the droids R2-D2 and C-3PO escape the Rebel Blockade Runner when it is captured by a Star Destroyer; Princess Leia directs them to deliver vital strategic information to Obi-Wan Kenobi on Tatooine, where the pod crashes, and the droids are first captured by Jawas and later bought by Luke Skywalker's uncle.

• Star Wars Galaxies online game:

All multiplayer ships have an escape pod which can be used by passengers and the pilot to escape from the ship. The player lands on the last planet they set foot upon.

• Stargate SG-1 TV show:

Goa'uld ships are equipped with sarcophagus like escape pods designed for a single occupant. Anubis' mothership also possessed an escape pod capable of hyperspace travel.

• Starship Troopers film:

As the ship Rodger Young is destroyed above Planet P, Carmen and Zander evacuate in one of the ship's escape pods; however their pod lands in a bug cave deep underground.

• In Solaris (1972) by Andrei Tarkovsky the astronaut Kris Kelvin tries to get rid of the ghostlike incarnation of his former wife by locking her in a space pod and firing her out into space.

• System Shock computer game series:

In System Shock the player can attempt to depart Citadel station in an escape pod after setting the self destruct sequence but SHODAN prevents the launch.

In System Shock 2 the player launches himself into the body of The Many using one of the UNN Rickenbackers escape pods. At the end of the game, SHODAN is seen possessing the body of one of the survivors that managed to get into a Von Braun escape pod.

Terrorist Egor Korshunov (Gary Oldman) confronts the President of the United States (Harrison Ford). ... For the silent film actor, see Harrison Ford (silent film actor). ... Because of both the secrecy of secret services and the controversial nature of the issues involved, there is some difficulty in separating the definitions of secret service, secret police, intelligence agency etc. ... For the current aircraft, see Boeing VC-25. ... Apollo Spacecraft: Command Module, Service Module, Lunar Module. ... Escape from New York is a 1981 science fiction/action film directed and scored by John Carpenter. ... Federal courts Supreme Court Circuit Courts of Appeal District Courts Elections Presidential elections Midterm elections Political Parties Democratic Republican Third parties State & Local government Governors Legislatures (List) State Courts Local Government Other countries Atlas  US Government Portal      For other uses, see President of the United States (disambiguation). ... For the current aircraft, see Boeing VC-25. ... New York, New York and NYC redirect here. ... Allegiance paper box Allegiance is an MMOG providing a mix of real-time strategy and player piloted space combat. ... This article is about the first film in a series. ... Warrant Officer Ellen Ripley, played by Sigourney Weaver, is the protagonist in the Alien movie series. ... USCSS The Nostromo is a fictional starship, featured in the 1979 film Alien. ... For the 1944 movie, see Lifeboat (film). ... Aliens is a 1986 science fiction movie directed by James Cameron and starring Sigourney Weaver, Michael Biehn, Lance Henriksen, Carrie Henn, Bill Paxton and Paul Reiser. ... Alien³ is a science fiction/horror film that opened May 22, 1992. ... EVE Online is a persistent world multiplayer online game set in space. ... Faster-than-light (also superluminal or FTL) communications and travel are staples of the science fiction genre. ... Halo: Combat Evolved, or simply Halo, is a video game in the first-person shooter (FPS) genre, created by the Microsoft-owned Bungie Studios. ... Master Chief Petty Officer John-117, commonly called Master Chief, is the fictional protagonist of the Halo universe, created by Bungie Studios, and is a player character in the trilogy of science fiction first-person shooter video games Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, and Halo 3. ... This article is about the video game. ... For the 2005 movie, see Planetfall (movie). ... Zork I is one of the first interactive fiction games, as well as being one of the first commercially sold. ... Serenity is a 2005 science fiction space western/epic film written and directed by Joss Whedon. ... Simpsons redirects here. ... A nuclear power station. ... Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station consisted of two pressurized water reactors manufactured by Babcock & Wilcox each inside its own containment building and connected cooling towers. ... Homer Simpson is also a character in the book and film The Day of the Locust. ... Waylon Smithers, Jr. ... Bold text Spaceballs is a 1987 science fiction parody film co-written, directed by, and starring Mel Brooks. ... Mel Brooks (born June 28, 1926) is an Academy Award-winning American director, writer, comedian, actor and producer best known as a creator of broad film farces and comedy parodies. ... This article is about the entire Star Trek franchise. ... Emissary was the first episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. ... Space station Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (ST:DS9 or STDS9 or DS9 for short) is a science fiction television series produced by Paramount and set in the Star Trek universe. ... Combatants Borg Collective United Federation of Planets Strength 1 Borg cube 40 Starfleet vessels Casualties Unknown casualties, no starships 11,000+ casualties, 39 starships The Battle of Wolf 359 is a fictional battle between the United Federation of Planets Starfleet and the Borg Collective depicted in the Star Trek: The... Commander is a military rank which is also sometimes used as a military title depending on the individual customs of a given military service. ... Benjamin Lafayette Sisko, played by Avery Brooks, is the main character of the television series Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. ... Jake Sisko is a character in the fictional Star Trek universe, played by Cirroc Lofton. ... Star Trek: First Contact (Paramount Pictures, 1996; see also 1996 in film), is the eighth feature film based on the popular Star Trek science fiction television series. ... Jean-Luc Picard is a fictional Star Trek character portrayed by Patrick Stewart. ... The Borg are a race of cyborgs in the fictional Star Trek universe, first introduced in the Star Trek: The Next Generation TV series. ... The fictional Sovereign-class USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-E or Enterprise-E) is the primary setting of the films Star Trek: First Contact, Star Trek: Insurrection, and Star Trek: Nemesis. ... Space station Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (ST:DS9 or STDS9 or DS9 for short) is a science fiction television series produced by Paramount and set in the Star Trek universe. ... The Changing Face of Evil is an episode from the seventh season of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the fourth of the ten final chapters. ... For the ship seen in Star Trek: The Original Series The Tholian Web and Star Trek: Enterprises In a Mirror, Darkly, see USS Defiant (NCC-1764). ... Breen soldier appearing on Star Trek: Deep Space 9 The Breen are a species in the science fiction franchise Star Trek. ... The starship Voyager (NCC-74656), an Intrepid-class starship. ... The starship Enterprise (NX-01) Star Trek: Enterprise is a science fiction television series set in the Star Trek universe. ... In a Mirror, Darkly is a two-part episode of Star Trek: Enterprise. ... Tholians are a starfaring and extremely territorial race in the Star Trek fictional universe. ... This article is about the series. ... Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith is the third episode of the Star Wars film series (but the sixth film to be produced), to be released on Thursday, May 19, 2005. ... General Grievous is a fictional character from the Star Wars universe. ... The Trade Federation is a fictional organization that exists in the Star Wars universe at the time of the Galactic Republic. ... Coruscant Coruscant (pronounced //) is a fictional planet in the Star Wars universe. ... Anakin Skywalker is the central character in the Star Wars franchise. ... Obi-Wan Kenobi is a fictional character in the Star Wars universe. ... This movie poster for Star Wars depicts many of the films important elements, such as Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Han Solo, X-Wing and Y-Wing fighters Star Wars, retitled Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope in 1981 (see note at Title,) is the original (and in chronological... Luke Skywalker in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope along side astromech droid R2-D2, and protocol droid C-3PO. This is the concept of the droid in science fiction. ... R2-D2 (called R2, or Artoo for short), is a fictional character in the Star Wars universe. ... C-3PO (pronounced IPA: []., often shortened to Threepio) is a fictional character from the Star Wars universe, who appears in both the original Star Wars films and the prequel trilogy. ... In the fictional Star Wars universe, the Rebel Alliance, or more formally, the Alliance to Restore the Republic, was an interstellar political resistance force formed in direct military opposition to the Galactic Empire. ... In the fictional Star Wars saga, the blockade runner Tantive IV, was a Corellian Corvette used by Bail Organa and later his adoptive daughter Leia Organa. ... A group of Imperial Star Destroyers. ... Her Royal Highness, Princess Leia Organa of Alderaan (born in 19 BBY), born Leia Amidala Skywalker, is a fictional character in the Star Wars universe played by Aiden Barton in Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, actress Carrie Fisher in Star Wars: Episodes IV-VI, and by Ann... Obi-Wan Kenobi is a fictional character in the Star Wars universe. ... In George Lucass Star Wars saga, Tatooine is the home planet of the Skywalker family and Ben Kenobi, the setting for much of the action in the sagas films (as well as several of the novels and other pieces of written fiction) and one of the most iconic... // The Falleen are a scaled, cold-blooded, reptilian humanoid species with pigmentation that varies with mood, known to be as long lived as the Hutts (the Falleen have an average lifespan of 250 Standard Years) who inhabit and originate from the planet Falleen. ... Luke Skywalker is a fictional character in the Star Wars universe, portrayed by Mark Hamill in the films Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, and Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi. ... Otherworldly wildlife -- Terryl Whitlatchs creature study of Tatooine inhabitants This article is about minor characters in the fictional Star Wars universe who reside, or at least appear primarily, on the planet Tatooine. ... For other uses, see Star Wars Galaxy. ... Stargate SG-1 (often abbreviated as SG-1) is a science fiction television series, part of the Stargate franchise. ... The Goauld (pronounced go-ah-OOLD , commonly GOOLD, or go-OOLD) are a fictional parasitic alien race in the science fiction television series Stargate SG-1 universe. ... Starship Troopers is a 1997 film directed by Paul Verhoeven, written by Edward Neumeier, and starring Casper Van Dien, Dina Meyer and Denise Richards. ... Solaris (Russian: , Solyaris) is a 1972 Soviet film based on the novel Solaris by Polish author StanisÅ‚aw Lem. ... “Tarkovsky” redirects here. ... For the Doctor Who novel, see System Shock (Doctor Who). ... For the rank in martial arts and Go, see Shodan. ... System Shock 2 (commonly abbreviated SS2 or Shock2) is a science fiction horror-themed hybrid game which incorporates a number of elements commonly seen in computer role-playing games and first-person shooters. ... The Many is one of the two main antagonists of the Irrational Games computer game System Shock 2. ...

See also

• Escape Pod: The Science Fiction Podcast Magazine
• Lifeboats
• Lifepod movie