Thal Solar-system

System Specs:

  • Stellar Mass:  N/A Sol Masses
  • Stellar Class:  K
  • Luminosity:  N/A Sol
  • Planets:  4
  • Moons:  >2
  • Asteroid Belts:  2
  • Asteroids:  2
  • Objects:  0

Prerequisite: Leviathan: Find Garneau (Mass Effect 3)
Thal’s development is largely due to the settlement of independent turians on Altakiril. They built secret installations on Xerceo’s moons. Resource exploitation is low due to cost-ineffective methods, though there is some interest terraforming Sarait.

By 2186, most traces of civilization in the system have been wiped out by the Reapers.

 

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Planets Directory:

  1. Garan
  2. Sarait
  3. Altakiril
  4. Tyrix
  5. asteroid belt
  6. Xerceo
  7. Virits
  8. asteroid belt

 

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Garan:

  • Orbital Distance:  0.0172 AU
  • Orbital Period:  17.52 Earth-years
  • Keplerian Ratio:  N/A
  • Radius:  11,703 km
  • Day Length:  17.52 Earth-hours
  • Atmospheric Pressure:  0.67 atm
  • Surface Temp:  1,284 °C
  • Surface Gravity:  1.56 g
  • Mass:  5.213 Earth-masses

Garan is the innermost planet of the Thal system, which is less than 2.56 million kilometers from its K-class parent star. Temperatures on the sunward side of this tidally locked planet reach more than 2,800 Celsius, boiling away earth and stone. These gases are then carried away by wind from the hottest point to the zone where temperatures are cool enough for the gaseous mixture to re-condense, leading to the unusual weather phenomenon of rains of rocks.

Garan remains largely unexploited by commercial interests, as the heat of the star tends to ward off all but well-funded collection ships like the so-called “Inferno-class” that mine eezo near energetic stars. Garan does not appear to have eezo, and its other elements are not worth the setup cost.

 

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Sarait:

  • Orbital Distance:  0.85 AU
  • Orbital Period:  0.87 Earth-years
  • Keplerian Ratio:  0.811
  • Radius:  10,413 km
  • Day Length:  65.0 Earth-hours
  • Atmospheric Pressure:  5.18 atm
  • Surface Temp:  94 °C
  • Surface Gravity:  1.82 g
  • Mass:  4.815 Earth-masses

A large terrestrial, Sarait’s methane-rich atmosphere might be mistaken for that of a true hothouse planet. However, some terraforming corporations have targeted it for development since Sarait has already given rise to some cyanobacteria in the liquid water that can be found near its poles. There is some evidence that the planet has been fluctuating between methane-heavy and oxygen-heavy atmospheres for several million years, each cycle dependent on the nutrients in the ocean that led to bacterial growth or crashes.

Star charts catalog several scientific stations studying Sarait, but all appear to have been destroyed by the Reapers.

 

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Altakiril:

  • Orbital Distance:  1.6 AU
  • Orbital Period:  2.3 Earth-years
  • Keplerian Ratio:  0.774
  • Radius:  4,145 km
  • Day Length:  19.2 Earth-hours
  • Atmospheric Pressure:  1.19 atm
  • Surface Temp:  −24 °C
  • Surface Gravity:  _ 0.66 g
  • Mass:  _ 0.78 Earth-masses
  • Colony:  Turian
    Capital:  Estivus Erax, founded 2021 CE, population 13,500,000 (pre-invasion; before The Reapers)

Altakiril is a garden world on the outer edge of its star’s habitable zone. The planet is largely frozen, yet it features native dextro-amino-acid-based life in its lower latitudes. These species evolved to withstand periodic freezing and compensate for the cold with spectacular population explosions during the long, mild summers.

Hardy, independent-minded turians colonized the planet. The quarians briefly considered contesting them but were daunted by the virulence of the planet’s infectious life during the growing season, not to mention the colonists who had ties to warlords elsewhere in the Shrike Abyssal.

Altakiril’s citizens were wiped out by Reapers [sic] bombardment despite the planet having a reasonably high population, which would usually make it a candidate for harvesting. Allied intelligence suggests that the colonists kept anti-space defense weaponry in population centers, so the Reapers limited their risk by destroying the threat and moving on.

 

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Tyrix:

  • Orbital Distance:  3.3 AU
  • Orbital Period:  6.7 Earth-years
  • Keplerian Ratio:  N/A
  • Radius:  808 km
  • Day Length:  5.21 Earth-hours
  • Atmospheric Pressure:  Trace atm
  • Surface Temp:  −140 °C
  • Surface Gravity:  0.015 g
  • Mass:  0 Earth-masses

Tyrix, one of the largest objects in Thal’s asteroid belt, is a metallic asteroid with an iron-nickel core under a rocky olivine mantle. It is possibly a remnant protoplanet prevented from forming into anything bigger by gravitational disturbances from Xerceo.

 

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Xerceo:

  • Orbital Distance:  5.4 AU
  • Orbital Period:  18.1 Earth-years
  • Keplerian Ratio:  0.481
  • Radius:  74,616 km
  • Day Length:  16.4 Earth-hours
  • Atmospheric Pressure:  N/A atm
  • Surface Temp:  N/A °C
  • Surface Gravity:  N/A g
  • Mass:  _ 0.78 Earth-masses
  • Satellites:  >2

A hydrogen-helium gas giant, Xerceo’s many moons were developed along with the colonization of Altakiril. It is believed that the majority of them were military in nature, a common theme among turian colonies. Specifics are few. Altakiril’s government kept its records classified, and the Reapers have systematically destroyed the installations here.

 

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Virits:

  • Orbital Distance:  7.3 AU
  • Orbital Period:  22.1 Earth-years
  • Keplerian Ratio:  N/A
  • Radius:  651 km
  • Day Length:  11.4 Earth-hours
  • Atmospheric Pressure:  Trace atm
  • Surface Temp:  −161 °C
  • Surface Gravity:  0.01 g
  • Mass:  0 Earth-masses

Virits is a large, stony asteroid in the Thal system’s Rakari Belt. There are no records of its colonization, but it is included on star charts as it is well-known by astronomers on Altakiril who could observe it with low-power telescopes during certain portions of its orbit.

 

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