How is Charybdis powered?

How is Charybdis from The Odyssey powered? As odd as it seems, I'm looking for a science-based answer.

• She needs energy. To suck down warships, she is at least 75 ft in diameter and must suck them at least 15 ft down (probably more). That column of water weighs 2050 tons (and that's a low-end estimate). To raise it back up from where Charybdis is holding it (she spits it back out again). is going to mean lifting 2000+ tons 15+ feet. By my calculations, that's about 20,000 Cal/lift, at 100% efficiency. 3 times a day.
• She's not eating people: ships rarely sail through the strait and those that do stay near Scylla, so she can't possibly be sitting around sucking water 3 times a day for those few occasions when ships do come by.
• She's not eating wood, either: she spits out broken bits of Odysseus's ship and he grabs a part to paddle out of there.
• It seems difficult to believe that she could be filter feeding plankton (or other stuff): she doesn't move and would quickly deplete plankton stocks in her vicinity. Also, her energy consumption of 60,000 Cal is much more than other filter feeders.
• She's not tidally powered: she is on a 3 cycles/day timer and tides are roughly 2 times/day.

My current best guess is nuclear: she's filtering out deuterium and fusing it for energy, however this seems a little far-fetched.

Note: I couldn't figure out what tags would work for this question, so please edit and add/remove them if needed.

posted almost 8 years ago

dpdt‭

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