Hammerstar Explosion

The ignition of the Hammerstar occurred in 53250, and the kill-zone (KZ) reached its maximum size in 77850. The "collapse" began almost immediately and was caused by a number of combined reasons, but the strain it placed on shipping is certainly one of the main factors. It took fifty years to get the collapse started. Once it started, it moved to trailing at a rapid pace.

The Collapse

Many worlds were caught off guard by the ignition and propagation of the effects of the Hammerstar. Forty-five billion sentients immediately died in the initial blast. As the wake of the explosion swept further out into the surrounding stars, more lives were lost however,with information about the Hammerstar spreading, many worlds evacuations were more and more successful. Still, more lives were lost because of the immensity of the collapse zone spreading out and those that died were usually those who could not afford a ticket off-world before the end came. Another 120 billion lives were lost in the next 200 years following the start of the disaster. Then, a new dynamic began to form. In the first fifty years of the expansion, another 400 billion sentient lives were lost as a direct result of the supernova, and the disaster began to reach outside the kill-zone (KZ).

Overall, untold trillions died due to the collapse. The Hammerstar took its toll beyond its immediate grasp. Civilization fell toward the tip of the Muralis Arm. The Heller expedition of 88050 reached a full two kiloparsecs to trailing and still did not find the far side of the devastation zone, if one existed. Macro Economists explained this phenomenon as a kind of anti-synergy; the opposite of the kind that has made the galaxy, overall, stable for 691 centuries. The Hammerstar was the 249th supernova since the first one discovered many millenia ago. But what was different was the placement, the timing, and the surprise. Predictions of the pre-cursor star's extinction model had given an estimate of a million years minimum before the Hammerstar was "scheduled" to go supernova. Four star systems were caught off-guard, with scarcely two months before detection and the first wave of lethal radiation. The Republic had already started a program to reduce the population of these systems, two of them with high population worlds, within a parsec of the former star. Many had taken the long view toward the prospect of a local supernova explosion, but the star had died too early for plans.

The disruption to regional shipping, and the lack of any jump conduits with endpoints within the KZ are the two most prominent factors blamed for the collapse. There have been other regional collapses, but none involving this much territory, and none have been attributable directly to a supernova.

The Argosil Republic Scout Service (RSS) conducts operations in each of the CZ sectors adjacent to The Republic. The Area of Operations (AO) has the look and feel of a district under military rule. Check with the controlling RSS office before entering any AO. Intended flight plans are always a bonus toward gaining access into these places.