We’ve seen it many, many times: the ship gets into a firefight, takes a few hits, shakes around, and consoles explode (possibly taking an unfortunate ensign with them). Eventually the battle is resolved with our heroes largely intact if somewhat shaken up. If it was a particularly nasty battle, there will be signs of damage: scorches on the walls, deformed equipment, busted lights, and rocks scattered about.
All of that seems reasonable… except the rocks, which look pretty out of place in a spiffy 24th century starship. So why are they there?
My headcanon is that there is some kind of advanced metallic alloy that, when exposed to extreme heat like an exploding photon torpedo, melts and then cools really quickly to look like a rock.
I’ve been making that observation for at least 30 years about how Starfleet components are silicate based.
One of thoughts I’ve had over the years is that what we as see as rocks is actually the afterproduct of an internal fire suppression foam.
There’s a lot of high voltage coursing throughout consoles, what with electroplasma conduits and all, and in a battle situation with shields trying to absorb energy from impacts the danger of overload is very real. When that happens, fire suppression systems spray the inside with a rapidly hardening foam to prevent catastrophic explosions. But when the systems get inevitably overwhelmed and the console blows, the expended and hardened foam shatters, expelled like rocky debris so make room for the next level of suppression to take over. Without the foam, the explosion would have been much worse.
Ah, you’re talking about the ROCK-E system: Rapid Overload Conversion to Kinetic Energy. It’s a safety feature. When the consoles are damaged, the exposed EPS connections would naturally send out highly energetic plasma arcs, killing anyone nearby. Instead, the safety mechanism automatically converts that energy to harmless matter and ejects it from the console.
And what’s with the electrical blowouts and explosions? There’s no need to run high voltage or plasma throughout the bridge, these are control systems, it should all be low voltage computers.
My understanding is that the “rocks” are a product of the electroplasma system being exposed to air. Whether that is some sort of coolant that is meant to seal the EPS leak in that console or some sort of EPS byproduct reacting in air, I don’t remember or have a head-canon for it.
All of that said, if I form this reply into one worthy of Daystrom, then I say it is an intended safety mechanism to protect the crew against catastrophic failure of the EPS conduits.