Primary:
Bangyian, spectral class F4V. ICN S4G0106F4V. Mass 1.38 standard. Stellar
Diameter 1.46 standard. Luminosity 4.42 standard.
Planetary
System:
Six major bodies. One inhabited world (Stuart, V). Three gas giants. Two
planetoid belts.
V
Stuart:
Mean orbital radius, 228.89 million kilometers (1.53 AU). Period 588.4 days.
No satellites. Diameter 9634 km. Density 1.0 standard. Mass 0.422 standard. Mean
surface gravity .75G. Rotation period: 27 hours, 14 minutes, 20 seconds. Axial
inclination 6°30'44.4". Albedo .40 standard. Surface atmospheric pressure
.95 atm. Composition, standard oxygen-nitrogen mix, breathable without
artificial assistance. Hydrographic percentage 85%; composition water and frozen
water-ice. Mean surface temperature 16°C.
Remarks:
The current colony on Stuart was established during the early stages of the Principality
of Caledon's expansion into space. However, Stuart has always been something
of a mystery because of the stories concerning a previous, failed colony on the
world established during the first wave of colonization of the Caledon region by
humans from the Terran Confederation.
Records of this first settlement are scanty. It is believed, however, that some
3,000 colonists came
to Stuart from Caledon (Reavers' Deep
1815) to found a new world. They sent back glowing reports of
the lush climate and primitive beauty of the new planet, but a supply ship which
orbited several months later could not establish radio contact or locate a
landing beacon. It set down where the colony had been built, but found no sign
of the people - only the buildings they had left behind. A fragmentary log tape
was found which told of a virulent plague, and a plan by survivors to trek to a
new site where plague-carrying animals did not flourish. But no trace of
the colony was found.
Stuart was left alone after that, considered a "jinx" by some, and a
potential plague planet by others. Eventually, though, it was resettled, and
superior medical technology prevented a recurrence of the plagues which troubled
the first colony. The original town, at the mouth of the Great River and the
edge of the Tangleglade Jungle, is preserved to this day, restored as a
historical landmark. Questions about the fate of the first colony are still
common, and archaeologists and other scholars occasionally seek answers at the
colony site, but little hope now remains of unearthing the truth.
Of course, stories have circulated from time to time of worthwhile leads or even
complete solutions to the mystery. It is variously held that Reavers
captured the surviving colonists and sold them into slavery, that an intelligent
native race exists in the deep jungle which wiped out the settlers, or that the
colony survived, and lives to this day, in some paradise deep in the heart of
the jungle. None of the stories is supported by proof, but it is undeniably true
that explorers in the jungle have reported strange noises, glimpses of unknown
beings, and other enigmas which are often claimed as proof for either of the
latter two theories.