Lawrence
Lawrence Class Patrol Bomber Tender
The Lawrence class of patrol bomber mobile bases were not combatant ships; they were merely a way to support the PBY series of long-range, low-observable patrol bombers. The first generation or "Mark I" was designed to support eight of the original PBY, while the second generation or "Mark II" was designed for the larger PBY-2. A second-generation 'Larry' could carry either version of PBY with no trouble, but the original ships were sized to fit the PBYs they were designed with and could only mount four of the larger PBY-2s.
The Sa'arm used an immobile orbital structure assigned the name Lares as a "bomber roost" to support large numbers of their attack small craft. When the Confederacy developed a long-range patrol bomber and a mobile base to support them, the base immediately became known as "Larry". The class was formally designated as the "Lawrence" class, but only the AIs referred to them as such. To their crews and the crews of their bombers, they were always "Larry".
Central Command assigned the hull type code "AVT" for "Auxiliary, aViation, Tender" to the Lawrence class.
Armament
As originally envisioned, each Lawrence would carry a pair of Light Particle Accelerator Beam (LPAB) mounts, a chin mount and an aft dorsal mount. However, the dorsal mount was deleted before the first prototype was built, due to interference with the liferaft. The chin mount survived until after the first few were in use, then was deleted as an unnecessary complication and the mount removed from the final design.
The production version of both Marks of Lawrence mounted two PDRs and two StarSparrow launchers, and nothing else. It was supposed to carry eight PBY's. Each PBY had a LPAB mount, and the Lawrence should be running _away_ from a enemy while the bombers fought, not joining the fight itself.
Lawrence-Class Liferafts
The Lawrence class was, in effect, a low-cost "throwaway" non-combatant ship that could reasonably be expected to get shot up. Since the design purpose for the "Larry plus PBY" weapon system was independent operations on isolated duty, no help could be expected when things went wrong. This led to several design areas where the Lawrence class deviated from standard 'best practices' warship construction:
- The hull included a dorsal mount for a modified "Liferaft" shuttle. This idea was taken from the old Castle/Ainsworth patrol frigate design.
- The ship's core AI modules and hyperspace generator were both actually mounted in the liferaft.
- The liferaft's pilot station was integrated with the ship's bridge.
These changes allowed the crew of a Lawrence that was in trouble to evacuate their ship into the liferaft, and then use the liferaft to return all survivors to a secure Confederacy system. Further, standing orders required that the liferaft be automatically launched if several different conditions were met, as the liferaft was the only way that surviving PBY crew could be retrieved.
Because of the possibility of the liferaft being launched with no one in it, standing orders required that the liferaft's pilot station be continuously manned when on operations. Then, with a pilot in the liferaft, there was no need to maintain a watch in the ship's bridge. In effect, the liferaft pilot station became the normal control station for the ship.
Beerat, the system which developed the Larry+PBY weapon system, had chronic manpower issues. The system mitigated this by using "crew-conks", shipboard crew-qualified concubines, wherever possible. This, in turn, led to the average Lawrence using concubines as pilots. The possibility existed, therefore, of a Lawrence being destroyed while all PBYs were away on a mission, and the liferaft -a hyperspace-capable starship- being manned solely by concubines.
Because of this, psychological stability requirements to serve as a crew-conk on a Lawrence were set much higher than for most other possible stations. In actual practice, it was common for a Lawrence to return from a deployment with half -or more- of its crew-conks having passed their CAP test and becoming elevated to Sponsors.
Story Usage
From Ending This Mess:
"...we came up with a mother-ship for eight of those patrol bombers. No way were we willing to call it a "Carrier" like everybody else was using. It was supposed to stay safely out of sight and provide a home with a hot meal, a clean bed, and a bedwarmer for each bomber crewman. It carried 16 spare missiles and could do some service-station type maintenance, checking the oil, washing the windows, and maybe changing a flat tire, but no major repairs. It was just a portable forward base that let the patrol bombers stay on station for as long as needed. It had a large central space that opened from below and was large enough to hold two bombers, if someone decided that they needed a higher level of maintenance than could be done out in the vacuum."
and
The barges, as we ended up calling them, had two PDRs and two StarSparrow launchers for close defense, but it wasn't expected to survive combat. It was completely expendable just like the patrol bombers were, and the 9th small craft it carried was an evacuation shuttle mounted on top, basically a Castle-style lifeboat with minimal propulsion, with a hyperdrive crammed in there somehow.
and
"We ended up making "will bring a crew-conk" one of the personnel qualification requirements to get assigned to one of these patrol units. If you weren't stable enough to have formed a decent bond with a concubine who was in turn stable enough to serve as a crew-conk, you weren't eligible to serve in one of the PBY squadrons."
and
"By this time we were on our second generation of both bombers and barges. The PBY-2's were still kept as small as possible to allow them to sneak, but they were a little larger so that they could carry two missiles each. The "Mark II" barges were a good deal larger than the original "Mark I" barge had been. They had to be a bit larger to support the larger PBY-2s, they had increased storage for missiles and fuel, and they carried two miniaturized tenders that were combinations of a tug, a miner, and a habitat/repair boat. By the time we had shoved in all the improvements that the scouts wanted, the newer barges were almost twice the mass of the originals."
See Also
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