Settling Haumea

Having laid out some basic on Haumea, I was planning some Kepler on it. (You probably saw this coming.) We start with the gravitational parameter: 6.67430(15)×10⁻¹¹ × 4.006±0.040)×10²¹ = 2.674E+9 m³/s² [rounded up].

At an orbital period 3.915341 h = 14095.2276 s; for haumeasynchronous radius calculate the following: Math.Pow(14095.2276 * 2.674E+9 / (4 * Math.PI * Math.PI), 1.0/3). This is 9846 m [round down]. Which is underground. Not just under ice but under silicon. Well; okay, we could have guessed this, just from its lobes being spun out from the rocky(-er) centre.

This implies we can have haumeastationary satellites if we chain them to the surface. Here the first equation would be where freefall gravity is canceled by the centripetal acceleration. Spin velocity (Math.PI+ Math.PI)/ 14095.2276 = 0.00044576685708711694 rad/s. By F = mrω²; if we want gravity, we can have this by a = rω². On the other side Newton says a = GM/r². So: r = cube-root of GM/ ω² = 238 km. Again: underground. Again: this accounts why Haumea has lost so much material and still has a ring.

Now I’d ask the altitude at which we from Earth can enjoy pseudogravity by centrifuge. This radius plugging 9.8 m/s² into a/ω² = 49,320 km from the centre just below moon Hi’iaka. Compare GEO 42,164 km. The tether alone is science-fiction over Earth and, anyway, the ring starts from 2200 km up. That tether not happenin’ at Haumea.

To sum up: chaining stations over Haumea is the only way anyone is getting onto its surface, rather to burrow into it. Hosing ices from the lobes up into those stations should keep the stations self-sufficient. The stations need supply their own artificial gravity, by rotation. They do get to rotate less the further out they are; unfortunately they will be limited below 2200 km and (depending on station mass) by tether-strength. Other stations at Hi’iaka and, below that, at Namaka would join Haumea to the rest of Kuiper.

Longer-term, Haumea’s rocky interior might be spun even faster as to make it an O’Neill; as The Expanse claimed of the remnant of Ceres.