- "Your tauntaun'll freeze before you reach the first marker!"
- ―Tigran Jamiro, warning Han Solo about the danger of hypothermia
Hypothermia was a condition caused by exposure to extreme cold temperatures that could be fatal if not treated.[2] The condition could be warded off through layered clothing[3] or by using a space heater to generate heat. While species adapted for hot environments like Rodians were particularly suspectible to hypothermia,[4] it could also affect beings native to cold worlds, such as the tauntauns of the planet Hoth. Tauntauns suffering from the ailment displayed distress signals of loud bleating and violently thrashing their heads. In spite of the cold, the internal body cavity of a tauntaun killed by hypothermia was capable retaining heat for some time after death.[2]
Han Solo experienced hypothermia in his hands when he spent the night before a coaxium heist[3] in 10 BBY[5] in the Iridium Mountains on Vandor with Tobias Beckett's gang.[3] Years later in 3 ABY,[6] while serving with the Alliance to Restore the Republic at Echo Base on Hoth, Solo rode a tauntaun into a snowstorm to find and rescue the missing Luke Skywalker. During this excursion, his tauntaun collapsed and died[1] from hypothermia because of the cold.[2]
Behind the scenes[]
Hypothermia first appeared in the 1980 movie Star Wars: Episode V The Empire Strikes Back.[1][2] It was first identified in the 2018 novel Most Wanted by Rae Carson.[4]
Appearances[]
- Adventures in Wild Space: The Cold (Mentioned only) (First identified as hypothermia)
- Most Wanted (Mentioned only)
- Most Wanted audiobook (Mentioned only)
- Solo: A Star Wars Story: Expanded Edition
- Solo: A Star Wars Story: Expanded Edition audiobook
- Star Wars: Episode V The Empire Strikes Back (First appearance)
- The Empire Strikes Back: So You Want to Be a Jedi?
- The Empire Strikes Back: So You Want to Be a Jedi? audiobook
- Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back junior novelization
Sources[]
- tauntaun in the Encyclopedia (content now obsolete; backup link) (Indirect mention only)
- Star Wars: How Not to Get Eaten by Ewoks and Other Galactic Survival Skills
- Tauntaun in the Databank (backup link) (Indirect mention only)
Notes and references[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Star Wars: Episode V The Empire Strikes Back
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Star Wars: How Not to Get Eaten by Ewoks and Other Galactic Survival Skills
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Solo: A Star Wars Story: Expanded Edition
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Most Wanted
- ↑ The timeline provided in Solo: A Star Wars Story The Official Guide places the Heist on Vandor nine years after the events of Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith. As that film takes place in 19 BBY according to Star Wars: Galactic Atlas, the heist on Vandor must take place in 10 BBY.
- ↑ Star Wars: Galactic Atlas