It’s a well known fact that cats take pleasure in destroying things, whether it’s that nice new sofa or that glass of water you left on the kitchen counter, but a recent post on the Elite Dangerous subreddit provides what might be the first known instance of a cat destroying not one but two starships in Frontier Developments’s online space sim. According to the post from user Cpt_Shinobi, a member of The Fuel Rats — an in-game organization dedicated to saving CMDRs who find themselves stranded in the reaches of space — one recent rescue attempt ended in catastrophe following the interference of a real-life feline co-pilot:
“On the Ninth of October 3304 at approximately 2:30am. After a successful rescue in Col 285 Sector KB-X A17-3 a feline co-pawlot aboard the responding Fuel Rat’s ship activated the ship’s boost. The resulting collision caused the loss of both the client and the Fuel Rat’s ships.”
Whoops. Cpt_Shinobi takes the opportunity to remind Fuel Rat pilots that the organization has standard operating procedures in place to prevent such occurrences, including lowering landing gear to prevent any unintentional boosts. Nevertheless, the post notes that it’s important not to rule out the possibility that “the cat might have stowed the landing gear, turned on the windshield wipers, ejected all cargo, turned off flight-assist, left paw prints on the desk and likely activated Silent Running.” Seems plausible to us. As is so often the case, the humans involved are left to clean up the cat’s mess, and the Fuel Rats are working to contact the client to provide compensation for the destruction of his or her ship.
