-As the show opens, the Pre-E is tooling along when they get a staticcy call rom Adm. Forrest. The comm situation was shaky, but was apparently going to be remedied when they deplyed the first comm relay station (which they were getting ready to do).

-Porthos is back!

-The ship? Y-class freighter ECS Fortunate. Maximum speed of Warp 1.8, crew complement of 23 (not counting anyone who gets born along the way). There were 24 people aboard when they found her. Armament on these ships is typically only one low-yield plasma cannon for anti-meteorduties, though according to Travis many ships tend to upgrade when they can.

-The ship looks fantastic. It's a spial arrangement, with eight seperable pods and twin nacelles tucked between the aftmost sets. The interior is pieced from Pre-E sets and new stuff, and lit differently to cover it up. A pretty good effect, actually, though one of the chairs on thier bridge has been seen on TNG-era bridges for years...

-There are at least two plasma cannons mounted on the pods on the starboard side, and two more on the bow. Effective range is less than ten kilometers (yikes!)

-A few shots from a plasma pistol will cause a breach in the hull. Two shots from the shipboard cannons can disable the long-range sensors on the Pre-E.

-When Starfleet recieved the distress call, the nearest Starfleet ship was three weeks away at its maximum speed, though the Pre-E could get there in a day and a half. But if the Enterprise was so close relatively, why didn't they get the distress call too?

-Travis was concieved and born on the J-class freighter Horizon halfway along the run between Dralax and Vega Colony, and is "a little smaller" than a Y-class. His folks are still alive and aboard the Horizon. Another ship mentioned was the NOrth Star, which met an unfortunate incident that was not detailed.

-Waitaminit - HORIZON? (Dum dum duuummmmm)

-Naussicans are described here as pirates, and had been around for years. Travis's folks had run into them at some point. Anyway, they have relatively small ships, but some pretty good shielding. They also have a really spiffy asteroid base complete with docking arms and stuff.

-There are apparently plans for the next generation of frieghters to be equipped with the Warp 5 engines. The math here is that even at Warp 3, a 5-year frieghter run at 1.8 would be cut down to six months. Anyone care to confirm that? Anyway, the frieghter crew wasn't too thrilled at it - they seem quite content with warp 1.8.

-Chef kicks ass. Hello, children!

-There are three more "NX-class" ships on the drawing boards. Are we seeing a naming convention forming here in this era?

Note the Vegan colony, familiar to the viewers of "The Cage".

Anyhow, this letter-class naming convention is a mucho cool idea, and we should all flog ourselves with wet cauliflowers for not having come up with it before. It makes perfect sense now that Kirk and McGivers speak of "DY class" in "Space Seed" - ship classes from that era would indeed be known by letter codes, not only by the geeks who now call a Hornet an "F/A-18" and a B-52 a "Stratofortress", but also by the public who now calls a Hornet a Hornet and a B-52 a B-52, following the CNN pattern. Thus the later generations would also be familiar with that nomenclature.

Furthermore, it's actually *innovative*. I don't think any historical navy has actually used such a designation system so far. Sure, each navy may have "S class patrol boats" or some other such single type at a time, but only amidst "properly" named other classes. And it doesn't appear as if the Starfleet usage would be similar to the British "L class cruisers" where all the cruisers had names beginning with L, either. No, it's something completely new = something very good.

BTW, does anyone have pics of the Fortunate? Vidiot's page doesn't have the usual promo material yet, and for some reason I can't open the promo reel from the site advertised at Trekweb or TrekToday.

Or then the cubic formula is not really in use. Since we have only travel-time estimates to go by, without any indication of the actual distances, we can't tell from these data alone.