[D-Roc]

Originally Posted by KatesFate

Out of curiousity, how many drops have there been that we know of? Was there only the one? Are they always dropped in the same spot I wonder?

Yeah, I think we've only seen one..and they were also alluded to in the Orientation video that Locke watched back in S1. Furthermore, Ben's fridge in S3 (and S4 - Eggtown, for that matter) was filled with plenty of Dharma goods, indicating that the Others had also benefitted from a food-drop top-up in recent times.

I'm not sure if they're always dropped in the same place..it's possible no doubt, although i think that it they be dropped in various places. Just a hunch really.

Your theory makes sense. Why else would someone continue to drop the food after the Dharma Purge? Unless of course they don't know about the purge, which I doubt.

Indeed..that's also a good shout..that off-island Dharma didn't know about the purge, but then we've pretty much seen that off-island Dharma don't appear to exist anymore So yeah, I think this theory could hold up on the basis of the purge long being over.

Originally Posted by Our Mutual Friend

Daniel's payload experiment did seem to prove that objects travelling to the island balistically take a long time to arrive.
But his delay was only of 30 or so minutes, whereas the drops show a delay of about 30 or so years. Peculiar...

Very. We also have Doctor Ray, who's body arrived to the island a day before he died..and then there's the chopper boys, who left the island during the evening and arrived on the frieghter during the day time. So this tells us that it really depends on the bearing you come in (or out) on. Perhaps why Faraday stresses the needs to stay on "325"..

Originally Posted by firebreathingfishies

I really don't get how the time difference could stretch as far as 30 years. Daniel's payload thing proved that there was a difference of about 30 minutes... I'm trying to get my head around it but I can't

I'll try to explain my understanding of it:

The payload was one isolated instance. It came in one one specific 'bearing'. This bearing equated to a island-time delay of 31-odd minutes from the real-world time.

However, as we've seen with Doctor Ray's dead body, and Sayid, Des and Frank leaving the island on the chopper..if you enter or leave the island on different bearings, these bearings each appear to have different time-consequences in relation to the island. So Doctor Ray's body entered the islands 'sphere of influence' (if you will) on a different bearing from Daniel's payload. Ray's bearing was one which actually ahead of current island time, as he wasn't yet dead in the real-world.

From this we can again establish that different 'bearings' (points of entry) each equate to the different time consequences in relation to the island.

So, seeing as we've already seen time-consequences ranging from seconds to entire days, I'm suggesting that the Dharma pallets which landed on the island in season 2, could actually have been dropped ages ago (10-25 years ago) from a time when Dharma were still in power..but due to the bearing which it was dropped on, it just didn't reach the island until recently.

This hypothesis could also mean that there are other 'things' currently travelling through specific bearings..aswell as things which have arrived on the island FAR sooner than they should have...perhaps this could even tell us something about the Losties arrival..or the black rock, even (although i realise the islands moving could now account for the Black Rock being stranded in the middle of the island)?