Revolving diagram of the USS Enterprise, NCC-1701
Image found on the internet
Cutaway view of the Constitution Class Heavy Cruiser. Click on a boxed area to obtain more information on its function.
Image captured from Captain's Chair CD-ROM
Cutaway view of the Constitution Class Heavy Cruiser. Click on a boxed area to obtain more information on its function.
Image captured from Captain's Chair CD-ROM
Officially, the first of the original twelve cruisers to come out of spacedock was the USS Constitution, NX-1700. According to recently declassified Starfleet material, though, it turns out that the USS Enterprise, NCC-1701, was brought out of spacedock before either ships were completed in order to perform a top secret rescue mission into the Romulan Neutral Zone. A civilian transport, the SS Rosenberg, encountered a heavy ion storm while it was on its way to colinize a newly charted planet. It was completely crippled and left without main power, and with bairly any life support. Worst of all, the radiation shelds were down, and it was still stuck within the ion storm, drifitng into Romulan space. Starfleet Command, with much persuasion by Captain Robert April, decided that the best hope for the crew and colonists were to send there newest and fastest ship to rescue them. Thus, Captain April took the Enterprise out even before she had had all of her internal space filled or even before she had had any outer markings placed on her. This was actually a convenience, as they knew that if they were spotted by the Romulans, it would be slightly more difficult to identify them as Federation without any markings.
Captain April had hoped that this would be a simple in and out mission, but unfortunately, there was a Romulan agent on board who managed to almost sabotauge the ship, sending it reeling into the Romulan Neutral Zone, while a Romulan Swarm carrier came in to attack. Luckily, Captain April had managed to convince combat veteran Commander George Samuel Kirk to be his first officer for the mission, and thus they were able to use the combat strengths of the Enterprise effectively enough to thwart the Romulans attempts at capture. They were then able to save the passengers and crew of the Rosenberg.
Almost twenty years after the first adventure of the Enterprise under Captain April, the torch of command was passed onto Commander George Kirk's son, James T. Kirk. Under his command, the Enterprise became one of the most famous ships in Starfleet history, prompting Starfleet to honor it in a number of unprecedented ways. First off, after it was dry docked in 2269 for a major refit, the admiralty adopted the Enterprise's distinctive command arrowhead symbol as the symbol for Starfleet, which is still in use today. Second off, once that Enterprise was destroyed over the planet Genesis, a second Enterprise was built, retaining the same NCC number with an A suffix at the end. Ever since then, there has not been much time during which there hasn't been an Enterprise of one class or another in the fleet. And each, like its namesake, has managed to put its name into the history books for its own deeds.
Aft view of the USS Enterprise, NCC-1701
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