Stone Needle

Warning: This infobox has missing parameters: type, terrain, fauna, interest, flora and unrecognized parameters: poi, era, imageBG

The Stone Needle, otherwise known as the Eye of the Needle,^[1] was a 60 meter tall rock formation in Beggar's Canyon on Tatooine.^[2] The formation was a tall stone tower with a "loop" rock on top of it situated in the middle of a ditch. The loop, lined with jagged rock teeth, was just large enough to allow small repulsorcraft to pass through. Early explorers speculated that the rock formation had been carved by extinct, native Tatooine beings, but no evidence to substantiate this theory was ever found.^[2]

History

Fixer: "Anything the great Biggs Darklighter could do, I can do. I'm as good as he ever was."

Luke: "Well, then why don't you thread the Stone Needle, like Biggs did? That ought to shave five seconds, or better, off your time."

―Fixer and Luke Skywalker^[src]

SOTE Beggars Canyon — "Threading the Needle"

Swoop bikers showed off their piloting skills by "threading the needle," or flying their swoops through the loop, a maneuver that required high speeds.

Luke Skywalker and his friends would often pilot their T-16 skyhoppers through the Stone Needle while growing up on Tatooine. Days before the death of his aunt and uncle, Skywalker challenged his friend Fixer through the bottleneck. With another of his friends, Windy Marstrap, riding along with him, Skywalker beat Fixer through the loop. Frightened by Skywalker's near-suicidal maneuvering, Windy squealed through the whole race. Skywalker later admitted to himself that he brought Windy along to prove to him that he was cut out for more than the simple life of a moisture farmer. Luke's success piloting through the Stone Needle convinced him that he was Imperial Academy material.^[3]

A year after the Battle of Yavin, Skywalker led several members of Rogue Squadron on a leisure run through Beggar's Canyon, introducing them to the Needle.^[4]

Years later in 3 ABY, Skywalker evaded a group of assassins hired by Prince Xizor by leading them on a swoop chase through Beggar's Canyon, and finally through the Eye of the Needle. Skywalker survived the maneuver, as he had many times before, unlike his final pursuer, who crashed into the needle and died in the fiery blaze.^[1]