| Main Article | Theories about The Hatch |
Main Discussion |
| Theories may be removed if ... |
|---|
See the Lostpedia theory policy for more details. |
Synchrotron[]
The various buried and partially buried stations around the Island are from an abandoned, probably only partially constructed, synchrotron.
The blast door map is consistent with the ring design of a synchrotron (but also reflects the floor plan on the easel in "The Man in the Elegant Room", an episode of Department S, a British detective TV series which contained much source material for Lost; after Damon Lindelof had been writing for detective shows and came to visit his father, we sat down and I told him of Department S as my favorite detective show of all time; it was before his time). The stations in a synchrotron are connected by tunnels, and we could surmise by various bits of evidence, later confirmed by Ben's mention of travel via them, that there are tunnels on the island.
Sayid remarked early in the series that the magnetic compass he'd borrowed from Locke was inconsistent with astronomic evidence of direction. The two possible explanations for this would be:
- The time of year was not what Sayid thought it was, indicating that he'd been knocked out and given amnesia for some time after he boarded Oceanic flight 815.
- An externally imposed magnetic field.
Although explanation #1 is equally likely -- Sayid was one of the (Manchurian) "candidates" who were brainwashed -- #2 could be accounted for by a DC current's being run thru the coils of a synchrotron, causing a fixed magnetic deflection over a wide area.
(The deflection of the magnetic compass is also an allusion to Arthur Conan Doyle's short story "The Horror of the Heights", which occurs among other Doyle stories that are source material, and that likely provide the name, for Lost. "The Horror of the Heights" also supplies the behavior and appearance -- except for lack of color -- of the Smoke Monster.)
Sayid said the last time he'd seen such concrete radiation shielding as present at the Swan station was at Chernobyl. However, the only likely place one would see such shielding in conjunction with strong magnetic fields is at a turning station of a synchrotron. The electromagnets causing the path of the electrically charged particles to bend around the ring need to be very powerful -- as shown by their Looney Tunes-like ability to move laundry machines -- and the bending produces bremsstrahlung ionizing radiation. No other radiation source was found at Swan.
A modification of the buried guidance and focusing coils of a synchrotron could be used to magnetically levitate conductive particles above the surface: the Smoke Monster. The Swan instructional movie illustrates "electromagnetism" by the levitation of a frog, which is consistent with the Monster's ability to manipulate persons and other objects (also consistently with the cloud monsters in "The Horror of the Heights"). The Smoke Monster would be under remote computerized control, and would be able to go only where there were buried cables: around the ring and on the branches that usually are built from a synchrotron ring. The undulating pattern shown when the Smoke Monster moves rapidly over ground is consistent with mag-lev.
Besides magnetic levitation, some combination of AC and DC pulses could allow for such actions as the blowing of the Swan hatch door high into the sky. A large electric discharge could temporarily turn the sky purple and interfere with communications, as was said to have occurred on Lost in conjunction with the ejection of the hatch door. The short range of magnetic fields is consistent with the lack of effects on other metallic objects on the island.
The amount of electricity used by a large synchrotron would require its own generator, consistent with the presence of the electricity generating station on the island on Lost.
A working title for Lost was The Ring, meaning that at one time the writers may have conceived of the synchrotron as the central plot feature.
The story given by Lost in season 5 for the construction of Swan station was a cover to fool Juliet and any others who were not in on the deception. The scenes were not taking place in the 1970s (the time jumps were all phony, products of brainwashing with the assistance of shills) but in the 2000s, and not at the location we'd previously seen for Swan. Hugo's joke about some of the equipment at Swan looking more modern than the rest of it was calling our attention to that as a clue. The supposed geomagnetic anomaly discovered there was pure hogwash. The sound made by the ostensible buildup and release of magnetism at Swan was the hum of an AC solenoid, and would have no reason to be associated with any natural magnetism in the earth.