True. On the other hand, materials science may have reached a point where high grade steel either isn't that important, or is produced by other means. ("It's cheaper to mine Mars, even with the treaties.") Certainly, this is the sort of thing that the Goddess of Technology would think of when writing her final report.

Another thought: What if any salvage operation on a ship makes it impossible to create a shipgirl in Asgard, either because she's part of a different ship, or because the ship doesn't exist any longer? I imagine it would be traumatic if a shipgirl's original hull was raised in order to make I-beams for a skyscraper after the shipgirl was created, but it probably wouldn't have the same effect as using the ship in a deliberate attempt to create a new shipgirl.

For that matter, it's possible Fubuki wouldn't have noticed anything if Buran didn't exist - that without the deliberate creation of Buran's Mental Model, there wouldn't be any consciousness to be aware of the events beyond the sinking. (Metaphysics is confusing, yo.)

Peter Eng
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