Enterprise, NX-01
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This article or section requires an update. |
| Enterprise, NX-01 | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Class | NX Class |
| Registry | NX-01 |
| Affiliation | Earth Star Fleet/United Earth |
| Status | Decommissioned (2161) |
One of the most important starships in interstellar history, Enterprise (NX-01) was the first NX Class starship, launched by the Star Fleet in 2151. Enterprise established United Earth as a legitimate interstellar power and caused a wholesale revolution in Alpha and Beta Quadrant politics, paving the way for the creation of the United Federation of Planets.
Contents
History
Development
In 2063, the Human engineer Zefram Cochrane unlocked the door to the stars for Humanity by his invention of warp drive. His prototype warp-capable craft, the Phoenix, just exceeded warp 1, the speed of light.
However, the sheer vastness of interstellar space made even this incredible speed insufficient for interstellar travel. To put this in perspective, at warp 1, the speed of light, it would still take over four years to travel from Earth to Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to Sol, Earth's sun.
Further development of warp drive was necessary for deep space exploration well out of Earth's solar system. This was done at the Warp Five Complex in Bozeman, Montana by several engineers, such as Henry Archer and Cochrane himself. Over the next hundred years, development continued until Humanity's first warp engine capable of warp 5 was created. This engine was capable of speeds that finally made interstellar travel in reasonable periods possible, i.e. in days, weeks or months instead of years.
Thus Humanity was ready to build its first true starship. Work on this began and, in 2151, Enterprise was completed.
Aside from its warp 5 engine, Enterprise was also the first Earth vessel to be equipped with a transporter rated for transporting biological organisms. However, the machine malfunctioned a number of times, and the preferred method of travel was still the shuttlepod unless all other options were exhausted. After trips in the pod, it was standard procedure for returning crew and passengers to utilize the decontamination chamber.
The ship was not as advanced in all areas, however. Unlike the Vulcan ships of its day, it did not possess tractor beams, merely grapplers.
Enterprise had a standard crew complement of 83 Humans, with the addition of a Vulcan and a Denobulan; approximately a third of the crew was female.
Launch and early missions
Enterprise was launched from the Warp Five Complex on April 12, 2151 under the command of Captain Jonathan Archer. The launch occurred three weeks ahead of schedule because of the need for Earth to return Klaang, a Klingon, to his homeworld of Qo'noS. The early launch was strongly protested by Vulcan Ambassador Soval, who believed Humanity was not ready to explore space. He did manage to wrangle a concession from Star Fleet, forcing Archer to allow the placement of Sub-Commander T'Pol on his vessel in exchange for Vulcan star charts.
The early launch of Enterprise meant that it left spacedock somewhat unprepared: its spatial torpedoes were uncalibrated, and its phase cannons had not even been installed. The spatial torpedoes were calibrated in the heat of battle in May of 2151; the ship only survived because of the intervention of the Axanar. The phase cannons were not installed until September of 2151 while Enterprise battled an unknown enemy.
Brief cancellation and missions afterward
In March of 2152, the ship's mission was canceled when one of its shuttlepods appeared to have ignited the tetrazine gas within the atmosphere of Paraagan II, killing 3,600 innocent colonists. It was this event, plus its actions at other planets including P'Jem and Tandar Prime, that caused the Star Fleet Command Council to recall Enterprise to Earth. Ambassador Soval recommended that Earth wait another ten to twenty years before trying another deep space exploration mission. Archer was able to convince the Star Fleet Command Council and the Vulcan High Command to allow Enterprise to continue, particularly when it was revealed that the accident had been triggered by outside forces.
In April of 2152, Enterprise suffered severe damage after an encounter in a Romulan minefield. Fortunately, the ship was directed by a passing Tellarite vessel to an automated repair facility, though Enterprise was forced to destroy the facility to escape unscathed. A plasma injector nevertheless failed shortly thereafter, necessitating a trip to the Kreetassan homeworld.
Search for the Xindi superweapon
After the Xindi attack on Earth in March of 2153, Enterprise was recalled home. Arriving on April 24th, Enterprise was refitted and upgraded with the new photonic torpedoes, enhanced hull plating, a universal translator update, and a new command center, and was relaunched on a new mission to the Delphic Expanse to search for the Xindi superweapon. Enterprise also took on board a detachment of MACOs for this mission.
The search for the Xindi was long and perilous, taking almost a year. Enterprise was in severe danger much of the time in the Expanse due to the presence of spatial anomalies generated by the spheres. It was discovered that insulating with trellium-D could protect the ship from the anomalies, but unfortunately trellium is hazardous to Vulcan neural pathways, and Captain Archer refused to let Sub-Commander T'Pol leave the ship. Hence, the shielding could not be used.
In February of 2154, Enterprise determined the location of the Xindi weapon and arrived in the Azati Prime system. There, the ship suffered severe damage due to multiple attacking Xindi ships. The primary warp coil was destroyed, damage that required drastic actions on the part of Captain Archer to repair. Enterprise might have endured even more damage in the Delphic Expanse if not for the intervention of an alternate future version of Enterprise, when the second ship traveled 117 years into the past when attempting to use a subspace corridor.
Enterprise accomplished its mission to destroy the Xindi weapon successfully, though Captain Archer was presumed dead. The ship was returned to Earth by a Xindi-Aquatic cruiser following the end of the mission, though it made a slight detour to an alternate version of 1944 with the help of Daniels. During this mission, Archer rejoined the ship after stopping Vosk's attempt to return to his own time, and subsequently bringing an end to the Temporal Cold War that had for so long plagued Enterprise's mission.
After returning home
The crew of Enterprise were hailed as heroes upon returning to Earth, especially Captain Archer, for whom several schools were named. Modifications to the ship included a new captain's chair, an upgrade to the transporter, and repainted door panels.
In May of 2154, a group of rogue Augments stole a Klingon Bird-of-Prey and killed its entire crew. The Klingons threatened Earth with war unless the Augments were apprehended. After a debriefing and a refit, Enterprise was relaunched with Arik Soong on board to try to hunt down the Augments on the border of the Orion Syndicate. After several brief firefights with Orion interceptors, the Augments found Enterprise and took Soong aboard their ship and set course to Cold Station 12. Enterprise pursued but failed to stop Soong from taking thousands of unborn Augment embryos. Soong headed to the Briar Patch; however, the Augments turned on him and headed to a Klingon colony and attempted to release several types of pathogens into the atmosphere. Enterprise arrived in time to stop the Augments, destroying them and their Bird-of-Prey.
When the Earth embassy on Vulcan was bombed, Enterprise was ordered to the system. The Vulcan High Command postulated that the Syrrannites had been behind the bombing. The crew discovered a bomb still in the wreckage of the embassy and confirmed the DNA was that of a well-known Syrrannite, T'Pau, but was later discovered to be faked. Archer and T'Pol went on a quest to find T'Pau in The Forge, leaving the Enterprise in command of Trip Tucker. After challenging V'Las's evidence on the bombing, Ambassador Soval was thrown out of the High Command and decided to stay with the Humans. Enterprise was ordered to leave the system, and refused to do so with its captain still on the planet, causing a skirmish with the Vulcans. Soval informed acting Captain Tucker the Vulcans were preparing to attack Andoria. Enterprise warned the Andorians, and the two fleets of Vulcan and Andoria met and engaged with Enterprise fighting on the side of the Andorians. The Vulcans called off the attack after only a short time due to political changes back on their homeworld. The discovery of the ancient texts of Surak caused the dismissal of the High Command, and Star Fleet activity was no longer to be regulated by the Vulcans.
Some time after the Vulcan Reformation, Emory Erickson performed a major overhaul of the transporter in an experiment on Enterprise, boosting the transporter range to more than 40,000 kilometers. The upgrade replaced the old transporter control pedestal with a much more advanced control system.
Later in 2154, two officers were contaminated with a silicon-based virus which had been beamed aboard Enterprise. As a result, a part of Enterprise had to be sealed off in quarantine.
In November of 2154, Enterprise carried a Tellarite delegation, including Ambassador Gral, to Babel. On the way there, the starship received a distress call from the Andorian warship Kumari. The warship had been attacked by an unknown vessel, although Andorian Commander Shran blamed the Tellarites for the destruction of his ship. Eventually, the crew of Enterprise learned that the Kumari had been attacked by a prototype Romulan drone-ship which was able to disguise itself as other vessels. Gral and Shran eventually managed to work out their differences, and Enterprise rendezvoused with a Tellarite transport ship which returned Gral and his delegation to Tellar Prime. Enterprise continued to Andor, where Captain Archer and Commander Shran encountered the Aenar, a blind race of telepaths. A member of the Aenar, Jhamel, returned to Enterprise with Archer and Shran and assisted in the destruction of the drone-ships which the Romulans had launched from Remus. Again, the starship journeyed to Andor, where Shran and Jhamel left the ship.
Enterprise returned to Earth on November 27, 2154. While there, Chief Engineer Charles Tucker transferred to the new NX-class starship Columbia. On Earth, Doctor Phlox was assaulted and captured by Rigelians. Enterprise followed the warp trail of a Rigelian freighter which had left Earth two hours after Phlox's abduction. The starship arrived at the freighter's coordinates, although the Rigelian craft had been seriously damaged and only wreckage remained. As Enterprise's crew attempted to determine the identity of the freighter's destroyer, a Klingon vessel attacked the starship. An away team from the Klingon craft beamed aboard and sabotaged Enterprise's systems. Although the Klingons returned to their ship, Enterprise was unable to follow due to sabotage. In the end, Enterprise was repaired thanks to a risky maneuver on the part of Columbia, when Tucker was sent back to his old ship. After this, the crew were able to save the Klingon race with the help of Phlox. The Klingon race was left with flat foreheads like Humans, with no cranial ridges, a state from which it took almost a century for them to recover.
A few days later, an Orion man came to present an offer to Archer: he would allow Star Fleet use of a planet he discovered. Star Fleet would do the mining operations and he would get 10% of the shares. To seal the deal, three Orion slave girls were given as a gift to Captain Archer. The girls seduced the crew and controlled the men. Tucker, the only one not affected, was able to foil their plans. The Orion man came to drag the Enterprise to the Orion Syndicate because they wanted Archer's head, whether or not it was attached to his body. The Enterprise stopped him by sending a shock through the deflector and disabling the Orion ship.
Enterprise was also present when Earth's leadership announced new trade relations with Vulcan, Andor, Tellar, and Coridan. The Enterprise crew were hailed as heroes laying the ground work for that alliance, a precursor to the formation of the UFP. It was during this conference the Crew was instrumental in thwarting the militant Terra Prime organization, preventing efforts to eject all non-Humans after Terra Prime hijacked the Mars verteron array.
Retirement
Enterprise was retired in 2161 to make way for new, more advanced starships. It was placed in a Federation museum where it still remained in the 24th century.
Achievements
This exploration was not entirely into unknown territory, as the ship was aided by the Vulcan star charts. However, it participated in several historically significant events, such as the discovery of the Temporal Cold War, the return to Terra Nova, continued involvement in Vulcan/Andorian hostilities, the destruction of the colony on Paraagan II, the first Human encounter with a non-corporeal lifeform, the discovery of a lost Human tribe in the Delphic Expanse, the race to stop the Xindi superweapon, the Augment Crisis, the Vulcan Reformation and the formation of the first Alliance with the Vulcans, Andorians and Tellarites.
Enterprise also made Earth's first contact with numerous species, including:
- Akaalis, July 2151 Note: Official first contact was unavoidably made with only a single Akaali, as this species was too primitive and still not warp-capable
- Andorians, June 2151
- Antarans, early 2153
- Arkonians, late 2152
- Axanar, May 2151
- Coridans, October 2151
- Enolians, late 2152
- Eska, November 2151
- Ferengi, December 2151 Note: This first contact remained unconfirmed until at least 2364
- Illyrians, early 2154
- Kantare, December 2151
- Kriosians, September 2152
- Kreetassans, January 2152 Note: The ship later conducted a follow-up visit to the Kreetassan homeworld in mid-2152
- Malurians, July 2151
- Mazarites, February 2152
- Menk, September 2151
- Na'kuhl, 1944
- Orions, May 2154
- Osaarians, September 2153
- Paraagans, March 2152
- Retellians, September 2152
- Risans, February 2152
- Romulans, April 2152 Note: First visual contact was not made until 2266; all that was seen of the Romulans was their ship
- Sphere Builders, December 2153
- Skagarans, October 2153
- Suliban, April 2151
- Takret, September 2152
- Tandarans, January 2152
- Tholians, late 2152
- Triannons, November 2153
- Valakians, September 2151
- Vissians, early 2153
- Wraiths, November 2151
- Xindi, September 2153
- Xyrillians, May 2151
Command crew
- Captain Jonathan Archer - Commanding Officer
- Commander T'Pol - Executive Officer and Science Officer (Note: prior to the mission in the Delphic Expanse, T'Pol was a Sub-Commander on detached duty from the Vulcan High Command)
- Commander Charles Tucker III - Chief Engineer (2151-54, 2154-61)
- Commander Kelby - Chief Engineer (2154)
- Lieutenant Malcolm Reed - Armory Officer & Security Chief
- Ensign Hoshi Sato - Communications Officer
- Ensign Travis Mayweather - Helmsman
- Doctor Phlox - Chief Medical Officer (Note: Phlox was a member of the Interspecies Medical Exchange program and not a member of Star Fleet)
- Major J. Hayes - Commander of MACO detachment (2153-2154)
