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Enterprise, USS. -
Featured on the science fiction series STAR
TREK/NBC/1966-69, this 23rd century starship was
the largest of thirteen Constellation class
starships in the space fleet of the United
Federation of Planets. Registration number:NCC-1701.
Its five year mission was to "seek out new life
and new civilizations" and act as a military
deterrent against enemies of the Federation,
i.e. Klingons, Romulans.
The ship houses a crew of 430 members-one third
female. Among them:
- Commander Captain James Tiberius Kirk (William
Shatner)
- Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy), the Vulcan science
officer
- Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy, the ship's physician
- Lt. Uhura (Nichelle Nichols), female communications officer
- Montgomery Scott (James Doohan), chief engineer
- Asian helmsman, Mr. Sulu (George Takei)
- Russian navigator, Chekov (Walter Koenig)
Slightly larger than a 20th century naval
battleship, the Enterprise is 947 feet long, 417
feet wide and has a maximum gross weight of
190,000 tons.
The primary saucer-shaped hull is 417 feet in
diameter and eleven decks thick through the
middle. In emergency, the hull could be
disengaged from the rest of the ship. The ship
is propelled by anti-matter engines, and capable
of a top warp speed of 14.1, equivalent to
one-half billion miles per second.
The two starship engines attached to the ship by
slender pylons were each 504 feet long, 60 feet
in diameter and contained a fusion
matter/anti-matter energy generator.
The Warp engines generally propelled the
starship through space in increments of Warp
Factor One the speed of light) through Warp
Factor Warp Eight (512 times the speed of
light). However, the safest prolonged maximum
speed was Warp Six (216 times the speed of
light). Speeds higher than Warp Six put the
ship's structure under considerable strain, and
so only in emergency situations was the ship
pushed to its limits.
The ship's weapons system included Phasers
(lasers) and Photon Torpedoes (anti-matter
suspended in a magnetic field).
The transporter beam (a molecular scrammbler/reassembly
device) transported both crew and cargo from
ship-to-planet or ship-to-ship.
Additional transportation was supplied by the
on-board shuttlecrafts, six or seven passengers,
limited range intra-solar vehicles, e.g.,
"Galileo"-Registry # NCC- 1701/7.
A revamped version of the U.S.S. Enterprise
premiered in a series movie spin-off Star
Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) and
subsequently, destroyed in the third Star Trek
motion picture In Search of Spock (1984).
It was replaced by a newer, larger, more
sophisticated design of the same name housing
1000 crew members/families.
TRIVIA NOTE: Matt Jeffries designed/constructed
the models used in the STAR TREK series. There
was a 4-inch model, a 3-foot model and a 14 foot
miniature. There was also a 2-foot and a 12-foot
model equipped with exterior and interior lights
used for complicated shots. The 14-foot model is
now housed in the Air & Space Museum of the
Smithsonian in Washington, D.C.
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