posted
I had this possibly brilliant, probably not-so-brilliant idea just now. I'd be very surprised if no one's tried it before, but I've never seen it...
Why not count the number of escape pods on a ship and use that to estimate how many people would normally be on board?
I started with the TNG:TM, since the guys who helped design the Enterprise-D would know the most about how those lifepods work and how many would be needed.
According to the TM, the Galaxy class carries 400 lifepods, designed to normally carry 4 people each (max 6). So, multiply that and you get 1600 people that can fit into all the escape pods -- plenty for the normal complement of 1000. So, let's assume that Starfleet wants to overestimate and have approximately 1.6 times the space vis � vis the normal crew complement, for safety's sake.
Now, let's test this out on the other ships we've seen: (Note: Since the TNG:TM says that pods can fit up to 6 people, I'm going to assume that most smaller ships fit 6 people in every pod by default -- the numbers fit better that way, anyway.)
-- Intrepid class: I've counted 42 pods on the physical model (pics from EAS). Now, 150 crew * 1.6 is 240. Divide that by 6, and you get 40 pods.
-- Sovereign class: I counted 200 life pods. Now, if we assume a crew of 850 (semi-official stat) * 1.6 equals 1360. Divide that by 6 to get 226 pods. The Sovereign might be slightly under-equipped with pods, but it's still close enough for me.
-- Defiant class: The DS9:TM deck plans (crappy though they might be) show 16 escape pods. I seem to recall a couple more in the Deck 2 "nose" section (seen ejecting in "Valiant"), but I'll leave them out for our purposes. Take a crew of 50 * 1.6 = 80. Divide that by 6, and you get 13 pods. Plenty of room.
-- Nebula class: Assuming a standard Galaxy-class model part set, you lose 36 escape pods in adding the dorsal pod and redesigning the engineering hull. So there's a huge excess of pods on the Nebula for a crew of 750. (I won't do the math here, it's obvious.) But then, we always knew that the Nebula was a big ship for its type anyway.
-- Nova class: This is the first one that seems to run into trouble... I only counted 10 pods, all on the dorsal surface. With a normal crew of 80 (ref: "Equinox"), they'd need space for at least 128 people. Those 10 pods would only have about half that space. (Possible explanation: the pods on the underside are covered under blow-away hatches like on the Defiant. But that'd be inconsistent design.)
So, let's try some extrapolation here:
-- USS Pasteur: I count 108 pods in the engineering hull, and maybe another 100 on the sphere (it's tough to tell without a decent forward view). That gives a crew complement of about 780 crew (with 6) or 520 crew (with 4 per pod). Seeing as how that's an awful lot for a 300-meter medical ship, though, it makes sense that they'd build in a lot of extra pods for the patients.
-- New Orleans class: I counted 108 pods on the model: 50 on the underside of the saucer in Okuda's color model, 46 on the top in Bernd's schematic, and 12 on the engineering hull in Bernd's side schematic. So, take 108 times 4 (for a Galaxy-era ship), divide that by 1.6, and you get a crew complement of 270. I think that's just about perfect!
-- USS Prometheus: I counted twelve pods. Well, even if it's a warship, that's just dumb, and I don't think that a ship that big (especially one that needed crew for three separate sections) would have a crew of only 72. I guess we'll have to assume that they had a lot more pods protected under the ship's armored plating.
-- Saber class: Based on the Fact Files schematics, I counted 108 hatches, which again translates into a crew of 270. That's a lot for a ship of only some 170 meters! But... the escape pods look kinda small to me. Let's see what we get with my Federation Models model of the Saber I've got sitting on my desk: It's 14 cm long, and the escape pods are 0.3 cm long and 0.2 cm wide. If we translate that to meters, that means the escape pods are 3.6 meters long and 2.5 meters wide. Assuming they can be no more than 3 meters tall (to fit into the deck structure), that means there's slightly less internal space to fit people into. So, let's say the pods fit only 3 people normally -- that gives us a crew complement of 202 instead. A bit more tolerable, but still a heck of a lot compared to the Defiant and the Voyager.
-- Akira class: I count 72 pods on the Fact Files schematic. With six people per pod, that yields a crew of 270. Or, with no margin for error in pods, that's a crew of 432.
-- Steamrunner class: I count 88 pods on the Fact Files schematic. With six people per pod (the Sovereign-types), that yields a crew of 330. That's actually just about right.
...So... I guess this isn't quite the magical solution I was hoping for when I started this message. After all, it depends on how much thought the ship designers put into the design, and sometimes it's not all that much, is it? Oh well... at least, I think it can still be used as a guide alongside other rationalizations.
What do you guys think? Did I bore you to tears yet?
-------------------- “Those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do.” — Isaac Asimov Star Trek Minutiae | Memory Alpha
Registered: Nov 2000
| IP: Logged
posted
Apart from the 'blow-away' pods, there might also be Saratoga-like shuttlebay-based lifeboats, which seemed to be capable of carrying about 20 persons.
The Nova seems to be the only real problem. The waverider might account for some of this. Or perhaps the Nova simply wasn't really meant to ever find itself in any situation where lifeboats would be useful, being a rather small science vessel.
They probably either had hidden escape pods elsewhere, or Sternbach meant it for a smaller crew than what they wrote. There's also the possibilty for 8-person pods, which have been discussed before. You'd have to cross-reference with the number of people who'd been seen getting into escape pods in instances like "First Contact" - and in that case, it's also pretty likely since the Borg had taken over quite a bit of the ship by then.
posted
Uh.. is it or is it not true that some lifepods on the E-D used the same hatch and were on a track system. I seem to remember something like that, was it from the Blueprints instead of the TNG TM? So this would throw off any calculations based on the number of lifepod hatches.
-------------------- Later, J _ _ _ _ _ ___ _ _ _ _ _ The Last Person to post in the late Voyager Forum. Bashing both Voyager, Enterprise, and "The Bun" in one glorious post.
quote:Originally posted by MinutiaeMan: I had this possibly brilliant, probably not-so-brilliant idea just now. I'd be very surprised if no one's tried it before, but I've never seen it...
Why not count the number of escape pods on a ship and use that to estimate how many people would normally be on board?
-- USS Prometheus: I counted twelve pods. Well, even if it's a warship, that's just dumb, and I don't think that a ship that big (especially one that needed crew for three separate sections) would have a crew of only 72. I guess we'll have to assume that they had a lot more pods protected under the ship's armored plating.
Are those pods visible when the ship sections are assembled together, or when they are separated? If it's when they are separated, well... but if it's when they are together, then there may be additional pods hidden on the "contact" surfaces. Though it wouldn't be a practical design if they have to evacuate the ship while still in a single piece...
Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged
quote:Originally posted by J:Uh.. is it or is it not true that some lifepods on the E-D used the same hatch and were on a track system. I seem to remember something like that, was it from the Blueprints instead of the TNG TM? So this would throw off any calculations based on the number of lifepod hatches.
I don't know about you, but I'd be pretty peeved if the ship blew up around me while I was waiting for the guy in the next escape pod in line to hurry up and get out of the way before I could launch...
quote:Originally posted by machf: Are those pods visible when the ship sections are assembled together, or when they are separated? If it's when they are separated, well... but if it's when they are together, then there may be additional pods hidden on the "contact" surfaces. Though it wouldn't be a practical design if they have to evacuate the ship while still in a single piece...
No, they're all visible while the ship is joined, and there are no hatches or anything similar along the surfaces where the sections attach to each other.
-------------------- “Those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do.” — Isaac Asimov Star Trek Minutiae | Memory Alpha
Registered: Nov 2000
| IP: Logged
posted
Eighty....that's a realistic number for the ship's size (it's just that VOyager is so under-crewed that it seems high by comparison).
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
quote:I don't know about you, but I'd be pretty peeved if the ship blew up around me while I was waiting for the guy in the next escape pod in line to hurry up and get out of the way before I could launch...
Perhaps on ships like the Nova, escape pod could be 'doubled up' by having two pods docked top to tail under a single hatch. That way they could either launch together or in sequence and if as you say the once closest too that hatch is empty or not completely full then people from the other pod can climb up (or down) to fill the seats.
posted
Jason: Really? Perhaps this is sort of a tangent, but I was always under the impression that Voyager, being a "utility" starship, only had along as much crew as she needed for the short-term mission of tracking down a Maquis cell. As this was her first mission, she probably hadn't taken on a full regular crew yet. This would include a bunch of scientists (rarely seen anyway given Janeway's annoying scientist roots) or even a full medical staff (ONE doctor and ONE nurse? Come on!). Given Dan's calculations, I'd be comfortable with the notion that an Intrepid's full regular complement were closer to 200.
Rev et. al.: The escape pods that were on tracks were the ones meant to accomodate the cetacean crew (dolphins and whales). My blueprints are packed away right now, but I believe the cetacean pods are actually part of the connecting tunnel between the main holding tanks. When they need to evacuate, everyone gets inside the pods, they seal off, and move to the egress point.
posted
I know. I was referring to the apparent inconsistency between the Nova's escape pod hatches and crew complement, not how all escape pods are doubled up or on tracks.
posted
Doubled-up pods aren't out of the realm of possibilty... Some sci-fi have just that (Starship Troopers comes to mind).
BTW, I just called up a graphic on the Equinox and found that there are fourteen pods, not ten. So, you've got room for eighty-four people, just barely enough for the normal crew. Given how lean a ship she is to begin with, I think it makes the Nova-class issue kinda moot.
Likewise, a closer look at the Prometheus shows at least twenty-two pods for a maximum evac of 132, assuming six to a pod (though strangely none of the visible pods are on the middle section!).
quote:Originally posted by Mark Nguyen: Jason: Really? Perhaps this is sort of a tangent, but I was always under the impression that Voyager, being a "utility" starship, only had along as much crew as she needed for the short-term mission of tracking down a Maquis cell. As this was her first mission, she probably hadn't taken on a full regular crew yet. This would include a bunch of scientists (rarely seen anyway given Janeway's annoying scientist roots) or even a full medical staff (ONE doctor and ONE nurse? Come on!). Given Dan's calculations, I'd be comfortable with the notion that an Intrepid's full regular complement were closer to 200. Mark
I agree that Voyager probably was not fully crewed on it's maiden mission but for a ship that large even a crew of 200 seems sparce: at three shifts (with some crew on days off) the ship is run by only 50-70 people? Small wonder losers like the Kazon and Hirogen could steal the ship with impunity.
Although the Intrepid class is from the oh-so-automated -future, it's still far larger (internally) than the Connie was.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
quote:at three shifts (with some crew on days off) the ship is run by only 50-70 people?
I wonder how much larger the Enterprise-D is as compared to Voyager.
And here's why I ask ... the Enterprise had a complement of roughly 1,000 people ... usually the number quoted was 1,012 (I think). But of that, how many were civilians (i.e., "families"), and how many were scientists working in the ship's vast networks of science labs? I suspect when you pare away the Enterprise-D's complement of non-essential personell, the actual CREW of the ship might be as few as three or four hundred. I mean, how many people do you actually NEED to run a starship? Even taking into consideration preventative maintenance, when you consider the "support services" staff on the Enterprise-D's crew (additional medical staff, teachers, etcetra), I don't think a total crew complement of 300 would be unreasonable.
quote:Although the Intrepid class is from the oh-so-automated -future, it's still far larger (internally) than the Connie was.
But ... so what? As Dax said, "They sure like to crowd 'em in on these old starships." Technological advances no doubt help double up on tasks for the crew, eliminating the number of personnel required. I mean, you don't see a comm officer on Picard's bridge anywhere ... because someone decided that the tactical officer could serve as a perfectly good communications officer, too!
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
Printer-friendly view of this topic
