800 lives???

[Sector 7]

Here's a cool way to rescue masses of people: transport them and store them in the pattern buffer until you get somewhere you can reassemble them in enough space.

That is a great theory, but did not always work out so well in practice. TOS-The Enemy Within=2 Kirks; TNG-Geordi & Ro as 'ghosts'; TMP- those poor crewmen. Maybe McCoy had it right, we were not meant to be transported.

 

[superstring01]

So the Kelvin carries a crew of nearly 800+? The Enterprise-D only carried 1,000 and the Pre-Shift Timeline 1701 only carried 430, why was the Kelvin so big?

It's a reboot. And the number, IMHO, is better. Just look at aircraft carriers in the USN. They have upwards of 5,000 sailors and marines onboard and are measurably smaller than the Kelvin.

~String

 

[BenRoethig]

A ship with 800 personnel isn't going to have a young Lieutenant (or Lieutenant commander if you go by the rank devices) is the X.O. Personally, I think there were more than a few instances were changes were made late in development and parts of the script were not updated to take them into account.

 

[Cyke101]

I forget who, but I know someone here has a really well thought out fan theory about the Kelvin: that she could have been transporting colonists, hence the large number of people on board, the large ship, and seemingly nothing heavier than phasers for basic weaponry.

Several of us arrived at this idea during earlier discussions. If someone were interested, the forum has a good search function that can answer a lot of the questions being raised again with the home video's emergence.

All I know is this: I didn't come up with that theory, but I wish had...

 

[EJA]

Sorry, but I can't buy that the Kelvin was 1500 metres long. I like to think that the Kelvin also existed in the prime universe, and if it was that big it would make the original USS Enterprise look tiny in comparison. I find the idea of vessels that gigantic existing that early in the original timeline VERY hard to swallow.

 

[JarodRussell]

It's more interesting trying to figure out how 800 people got off the Kelvin. I guess there could have been more than the 20+ shuttles they showed on screen, but then again there were only like 4-5 people on the shuttle with Winona Kirk.

Obviously because she's giving birth and requires privacy: everyone else could have easily squeezed in those roomy shuttles (or escape pods, which we don't see but that doesn't mean it didn't happen).

Privacy? The ship breaks apart, 800 people need to be saved, and someone needs to have privacy because she's giving birth. First, many women have been giving birth in crowded elevators, and then there's no justification for a single individual's privacy in a life and death situation.

 

[Yug]

Sorry, but I can't buy that the Kelvin was 1500 metres long. I like to think that the Kelvin also existed in the prime universe, and if it was that big it would make the original USS Enterprise look tiny in comparison. I find the idea of vessels that gigantic existing that early in the original timeline VERY hard to swallow.

I think it's very possible. Starfleet ships built after the Kelvin could have shrunk in the prime universe based on more automation. The Kelvin, being an older ship, probally had a crew of cooks, laundry staff, plumbers, and other janitorial and upkeep staff. Probally more crewman in engineering too, the bridge itself seemed quite crowded. Then as more systems of that nature become automated, with replicators and perhaps more mechanical devices, sonic showers... less plumbing, less mess hall staff, smaller crew smaller ships, and that leads to an Enterprise seen in TOS.

Then maybe after an attack by a ship as big and powerful as the Narada arrives on the scene at the point in time that it did, it may of changed the mindset of starship designers. More automation, but also more power, better weaponry, bigger warp drives, , they got to Vulcan pretty damn fast, I say these post-Narada Starfleet vessels are big heavy power pigs because the Narada changed the game. Technology in ship building advanced at a quicker level. The universe became a bit meaner and chaotic than perhaps it was in TOS's time. So, Starfleet and their ships adjusted accordingly.

 

[Jeri]

I forget who, but I know someone here has a really well thought out fan theory about the Kelvin: that she could have been transporting colonists, hence the large number of people on board, the large ship, and seemingly nothing heavier than phasers for basic weaponry.

Several of us arrived at this idea during earlier discussions. If someone were interested, the forum has a good search function that can answer a lot of the questions being raised again with the home video's emergence.

All I know is this: I didn't come up with that theory, but I wish had...

Ok, ok. As far as I know, it was me. I never saw anybody bring it up before I did; but it could have been one of those good ideas that suggest themselves to people simultaneously.

 

[Nerys Myk]

It was a maternity ship, transporting expectant mothers to Earth. Almost all the women on board had a bun in the oven. So the actual crew size was less.

 

[RAMA]

So the Kelvin carries a crew of nearly 800+? The Enterprise-D only carried 1,000 and the Pre-Shift Timeline 1701 only carried 430, why was the Kelvin so big?

Why shouldn't it be big?? There are lots of big starships in SF!

A modern aircraft carrier has over 6,000 crew and flight group at about 1100 feet long. It doesn't seem like such a stretch to have 800 crewmen in a ship almost one-third longer.

 

[RAMA]

The Kelvin was 1500 feet long, had a crew of around 800 and very industrial equipment. In the prime reality, Starfleet developed a 900 feet long Constitution class ship with lots of Jeffries tubes and automated equipment, bringing crew size to 430. In the alternate reality, the ships were not streamlined and grew to sizes of 2380 feet long, requiring crews of 1100 to maintain multiple warp cores, large bridges and industrial equipment.

That's my theory. In any case, whether you believe the new Enterprise is 1200 feet long or 2380 feet long, the Kelvin is 1500 feet long and is larger than the old Enterprise. Notice too how similar to 2230s Kelvin/Kobayashi Maru designs the new Enterprise is: large bridges with viewscreen windows.

Where'd you hear this? According to Berndt Scheider, official statistics give the NuEnterprise's length as around 700 metres, but he disregards this in favour of a more reasonable 302 metres (I personally concur with this). He gives the Kelvin's length as 250 metres, slightly smaller than the prime universe Enterprise NCC-1701.

As for the line about 800 lives, I just regard that as an error and ignore it.

There is no logical reason why 300 meters is more "sensible" than 700. He also happens to be wrong.

RAMA

 

[CommanderRaytas]

It's more interesting trying to figure out how 800 people got off the Kelvin. I guess there could have been more than the 20+ shuttles they showed on screen, but then again there were only like 4-5 people on the shuttle with Winona Kirk.

Obviously because she's giving birth and requires privacy: everyone else could have easily squeezed in those roomy shuttles (or escape pods, which we don't see but that doesn't mean it didn't happen).

And didn't they say she was being taken to a Medical Shuttle? There were probably other types of shuttles that held a lot more people.

Also, everyone sucked their bellies in.

 

[Classic Fan]

The Kelivn was a conception ship. A huge Robau love nest, with 398 women and 2 men. All 398 females were pregnant at the time, one with a set of twins.

 

[Jax]

It was 800 because the number sounded cool but yeh If I was writing it I would of wrote something like 400

 

[Creedence]

As for the line about 800 lives, I just regard that as an error and ignore it.

How can you do that. Pike's comment, as spoken dialog in a Star Trek film, is canon. The sizes of starships in the newest film are open to interpretation, but the number of souls on the Kelvin are not.

As for the discussion over the number of souls versus the amount and level of automation, I always found it a bit sketchy that LaForge and a very small team of engineers could maintain the warp drive itself, let alone the ships other systems. The power and heat generated by the M/A reation demands that equipment atrophy would require at least a hundred personell to maintain the ship.

I fully embrace the notion that more people are onboard larger vessels. It makes perfect sense that the engineering deck would be massive. It is a logical development. As much as I respect Gene and his legacy, he chose poorly the number of people needed to keep the Enterprise flying.

 

[RoJoHen]

He also said 800 "lives," not 800 "people."

Maybe the crew was only 400 people, but every one of them owned a puppy.

 

[CommanderRaytas]

Or had parasites. Those are lifeforms, too, you know. Pike never said "nice and friendly" lives.

 

[Jeri]

I think we're done here.

 

[M'Sharak]

Obviously because she's giving birth and requires privacy: everyone else could have easily squeezed in those roomy shuttles (or escape pods, which we don't see but that doesn't mean it didn't happen).

And didn't they say she was being taken to a Medical Shuttle? There were probably other types of shuttles that held a lot more people.

Also, everyone sucked their bellies in.

Maybe they had some of these guys.

 

[Cyke101]

He also said 800 "lives," not 800 "people."

Maybe the crew was only 400 people, but every one of them owned a puppy.

I really want to see Robau's puppy, which is probably a baby Cerberus.