For me, it was the opposite. I always assumed starships were much larger.
That’s Kirk’s enterprise mind you. Picard’s is twice as long and thicker with a big bulbous saucer.
I came here to post this. Glad to see my work is getting around.
Ya done good! The change in sheer size from A to D can be hard to grasp. I remember getting a model set as a teen with Enterprise TOS, A, and D, and was taken aback at how small the other two were. Crazy stuff.
The Constitution Class (NCC-1701A/B) were effectively light cruisers by the TNG era whereas the Galaxy Class was a super-heavy explorer cruiser. The main difference between them was the NCC-1701 was designed to operate for 5 years without service but the NCC-1701D could theoretically run indefinitely on its own without major battle damage. Large part of its mass is form the power systems needed to run its own industrial fabricators (replicators) and the experimental research hardware. That and all the families living aboard.
I was all “wait? What? It’s more than twice the size?” And then trying to find the right way to show it. I even looked at other pictures of the cargo ship but none were right for the comparison. One of my failed drafts.
Damn, the D IS huge.
That’s what she said.
Seriously, the E-D is huge to the point where the amount of time it would take to get anywhere on the ship would make it impractical. The E-A is roughly the size of its nacelle.
That was the point of the Galaxy-class of course. It was meant to be less “rough and tumble sailors” and more “long term cohesive floating city that could technically be self-sufficient for 10-20 years and show the technical prowess of the Federation” . Had to be big to support the 1000 crew compliment.
Except everyone IRL forgot that and now it’s an average size ship. Also, a ship that size could easily support several thousand people, not just one thousand. Modern aircraft carriers have thousands of people on them and their volume is comparable to the E-A.
I just always assumed that roughly half the ship was comprised of cavernous guest quarters.
Where else is Lwaxana going to store her luggage?
Modern aircraft carriers have thousands of people on them and their volume is comparable to the E-A.
they also don’t need to run completely self-contained life support systems that must generate and maintain water and breathable air rather than pulling it from conveniently free (or near-free) sources right outside the ship
The energy requirements for warp travel are also many orders of magnitude higher than pushing a carrier through water so the space dedicated to warp cores and other energy management/propulsion systems must also be greater
I always thought of the tos enterprise as being an unusually large submarine. The biggest of those irl is impressive enough, and it fits the way tos handles a lot of things.
But, I still thought it was bigger than what this picture shows. I thought of it being about the same length as a cargo vessel built to pass the panama canal, which is, I think what this ship is built for size wise.
panama canal, which is, I think what this ship is built for size wise.
Panamax is the largest vessel size that can traverse the Panama Canal. The dimensions for a Panamax ship max out at 290 meters in length, 32m in width. The Enterprise (no bloody abc or d) is 228m long, 121m wide, and 72m tall.
So this is probably not a Panamax ship but the ship dimensions in the photo appear to be incorrect for Enterprise so I’m not 100% sure.
The ship dimensions are correct for Enterprise NCC-1701A. That’s obviously what it is, the nacelles are pretty distinctive.
Props to whomever made that for taking the time to cast an accurate shadow on the cargo ship.
Wdym “made”? It’s clearly just a well timed photograph
Suppose I was to purchase one of these container ships. Then suppose I was to anchor it off shore somewhere warm. Then I built a house on there, making boat trips to shore for supplies. Would I have to pay any taxes on my houseboat?
Could bring in loads of dirt, start a garden, more dirt, plant some trees…
I’ll maybe let a couple chill people also come aboard, to build houses of their own… maybe.
I think it’s one of those things where you could do it, but if you had the required money, you’d do something far easier and more luxurious.
but dude, it’s like a man-made private island. Perfect zombie apocalypse shelter, you’d just have to ensure they couldn’t crawl up the anchor line
Even a big boat like that won’t last forever. You’d need a lot of maintenance just to keep it afloat long term.
Needs a lot of attention just to keep it anchored!
It won’t last long without maintenance at sea. Sea water is ridiculously corrosive to pretty much everything. If you want to live on a water, you better choose a smaller ship and put it on a fresh water lake.
Better yet you can stay on land and just build a hut somewhere deep in Russia. Russia has plenty of land where no human ever set foot, no one will ever find you. So you can live for free and do whatever you want. I remember reading Russian news a few years ago how geologists found a small village somewhere where people thought the country is still ruled by a Tzar. They missed Soviet times and Putin’s regime, lol.
People have tried that, and failed for various reasons:
- You can’t move the ship out of any port without insurance
- Insurance for a rusting hulk isn’t cheap
- No nation on earth will let you park your uninsured rusting hulk offshore, as it will pose an environmental and navigational threat to the area
- Even if you anchored outside a country’s 12 nautical mile economic exclusion zone doesn’t mean their navy/coast guard won’t bother you. They have maritime rights outside that area nonetheless.
- You’d still need to take the ship in for maintenance somewhere, and now all your regulatory problems begin again.
This is basically the plot of Waterworld
The maintenance on the steel hull would require a return to territorial waters, at which point you’ll need registration (read: taxes). The tender you use to resupply would also require registration and often insurance to enter into marinas.
dang. I just want a cheap private island
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You have to remain underway so if you can afford the fuel and maintenance, you can pretty much do whatever you want as long as you can defend yourself from hijackers.
If you try to anchor anywhere, you are going to be harassed or attacked by local militaries even if you’re in international waters.
A boat is a hole in the water that you throw money into.
This is such an underrated comment
Each of those boxes is the size of a semi truck. For comparison, Andrew Camerara’s castle is about 2 x 2 containers.
As a space boomer I’m a little confused. Could you put the Enterprise next to a real cargo freighter like a Y-Class? Or maybe a J-Class like the ECS Horizon? I’ve never been inside a non-artificial gravity well so I don’t have a frame of reference for terrestrial cargo “ships”.
Don’t link fandom you monster!!!
This would suggest that cargo ship crew wear roller skates
I used to work on a cruise ship, and I am trying to remember if they said it was the biggest cruise ship in the world (at the time) or the biggest ship in the world. It was NCL’s Pride of America. I know it’s not the biggest now, because even when I was on it they were talking about building another one that was even bigger.
Shit was like a small town. And I had to walk it up and down all day every day sweeping and mopping.
But how many football fields?
I saw this last week already.
