A question about the Botany Bay.

[Dukhat]

Nope. Lt. McGivers pointed out that the space craft prior to around 2018 were slow. And the Botany Bay was over twenty years before that.

The Pioneer space probe was slow too, and yet it made it into Klingon space in only 300 years. And the Cryosatellite (a contemporary to the Botany Bay) was slow too, and it made it almost to the Neutral Zone in only 400 years.

Real science does not work in Star Trek.

 

[Henoch]

That's certainly possible as we know from an earlier draft of the script that the Botany Bay was to have been a step above your normal DY100, granting it much higher speeds than the "it took years to travel from one planet to another" velocities implied by Lt Macgyvers:

I guess it is nice to know the intent of the writer as to the drive and speed, in this case ion particle drive with close to light speed. At these speeds, time dilation would "shorten" the journey for the BB taking a load off the drive systems, power systems and life support systems. Scotty's comment about a hundred years could give us idea as to passage of time inside the ship due to time dilation. (Using an online Special relativity (time dilation) Calculator, to give us the speed to give ~100 years inside the ship with a ~200 year real time trip requires the average speed to be ~0.9 c). At this speed, the BB would be about 180 lightyears from Earth.

 

[MAGolding]

There is no evidence in the episode that the Enterprise was coming from Earth or anywhere near Earth, only that SB12 was the closest Starbase.

There is a theory to explain many time/speed/distance problems in Star Trek that starships can use a system of space warps or stargates to travel instantly between one star system and another, thus cuttong down on transit time greatly.

Starbase 12 was the command starbase in "Space Seed" when the Enterprise's journey apparently would take it near Alpha Ceti (if Alpha Ceti was Ceti Alpha) , and was also the command starbase or nearest starbase in "Who Mourns for Adonias?" set at Pollux (Beta Geminorum).

Beta Germinorum or Pollux is about 33.8 light years from Earth. Alpha Ceti or Menkar is about 240 to 260 light years from Earth.

In the equatorial coordinate system, one of three or four astronomical coordinate systems, the direction to Pollux is 7 hours and 45 minutes right ascension, declination plus 28 degrees. In the equatorial coordinate system, the direction to Alpha Ceti is 3 hours and 2 minutes right ascension, and declination plus 4 degrees. So the declinations of Pollux and Alpha Ceti differ by 24 degrees of arc (out of 360 degrees). And the right ascension of Pollux and Alpha Ceti differ by 71 degrees of arc, almost a right angle, since each hour is 15 degrees.

So Starbase 12 certainly seems to have authority over a large region of space.

But if there is a system of stargates leading from star system to star system, a starship might jump 45 light years though one stargate, 11 light years through the next, 318 light years through the third, and so on during its journey. The star systems that are close to a starbase in the system of stargates could be scattered all over space.

So possibly the Enterprise was travelling from Star A to Star B to get to the system of stargates connected to Star B and use that system of stargates to reach its destination, when it crossed the path of the Botany Bay from Star C to Star D close enough to detect Botany Bay. Stars A, B, C, and D would be orbiting the center of the galaxy independently, and the directions between them would slowly shift slightly over time while the Botany Bay made its centuries long voyage. So the Enterprise could be the first ship to pass close enough to the Botany Bay to detect it.

Another possibility is that the Botany Bay was headed for Tau Ceti, Tau Ceti is about 11.9 light years from Earth, at the direction of right ascension 1 hour, 44 minutes, declination - 15 degrees 56 minutes, and one of hte nearest more or less Sun like stars. Tau Ceti is now believed to have five planets, two of them in or near its habitable zone..

Suppose that, after visiting Earth in "Tomorrow is Yesterday", or on some other occasion, the Enterprise was sent to Tau Ceti to patrol the Romulan Neutral Zone, and traveled through the 11 light years of space between Earth and Tau Ceti instead of using the hypothetical system of stargates to reach Tau Ceti, and so found the Botany Bay on its way to Tau Ceti.

Is there a Romulan Neutral Zone near Tau Ceti? Maybe.

In "Whom Gods Destroy" Spock sees two Captain Kirks, one of whom is the shape changing Garth of Izar:

SPOCK: Fascinating. What maneuver did we use to defeat the Romulan vessel near Tau Ceti?
KIRK 1: Very good, Spock. The Cochrane deceleration.
KIRK 2: Spock, you know the Cochrane deceleration's a classic battle maneuver. Every Starship Captain knows that.

So there may be a section of the Romulan Neutral Zone near Tau Ceti. There is also a section of the Romulan Neutral Zone between Gamma Hydra and Starbase 10 in "The Deadly Years". Gamma Hydra is presumably Gamma Hydrae, about 133 to 135 light years from Earth, and with directional coordinates right ascension 13 hours 18 minutes, declination -23 degrees 10 minutes, almost in the opposite direction from Tau Ceti.

In "Balance of Terror", set in a section of the Romulan Neutral Zone, Kirk sends messages to the nearest command base, on Earth or on a starbase somewhere. At the end of the episode:

KIRK: How many men did we lose, Bones?
MCCOY: Only one. Tomlinson. The boy who was getting married this morning. His fiancée is at the chapel.
(Kirk turns to go, and Rand enters)
RAND: We finally received an answer from Command base, sir. They say they'll support whatever decision you have to make.

So it took less than 24 hours to send a message and get a reply. In my study of the episode I think that it took about ten hours to send a message and get a reply.

In "The Enterprise Incident", near the Romulan Neutral Zone:

KIRK: You understand that Starfleet Command has been advised of the situation?
TAL [on viewscreen]: The subspace message will take three weeks to reach Starfleet. The decision is yours, Captain. One hour.

Assuming that a subspace radio message to the nearest command base took 5 to 12 hours in "Balance of Terror", and that Tal's "three weeks" was 17 to 25 days, or 408 to 600 hours, "the Enterprise Incident" could be about 34 to 120 times aw far away from Starfleet Command as "Balance of Terror" was.

So if "Balance of Terror" was at Tau Ceti, "The Enterprise Incident" could be between 375 and 1,320 light years from Earth, while if "Balance of Terror" was at Gamma Hydrae, "The Enterprise Incident" could be between 4,556 and 16,080 light years from Earth.

The minimum distance between Earth and "Balance of Terror" should be farther than the distance to the nearest command base, otherwise Kirk would have sent his messages to Starfleet headquarters on Earth. And of course sometimes there are instant subspace communications with Starfleet headquarters, which sets a certain minimum speed for subspace communications and thus the distance in "Balance of terror".

The Pioneer space probe was slow too, and yet it made it into Klingon space in only 300 years. And the Cryosatellite (a contemporary to the Botany Bay) was slow too, and it made it almost to the Neutral Zone in only 400 years.

Real science does not work in Star Trek.

Giving up on real science doesn't seem like a good idea to me.

the cryosatellite wasn't "slow", since it wasn't going anywhere. It would have been parked in a convenient orbit, around Earth or around the Sun, where it would be easy to get to when it would be possible to bring one or more of the occupants back to life.

The propulsion system of the cryosatellite doesn't matter since it wasn't intended to go anywhere, just to keep its station. Possibly some zany aliens thought it was fun to take primitive Earth probes and spaceships from our solar system to distant stars.

Mytran in post number 116 I think quoted a post from Alchemist:

Here's an interesting excerpt from an earlier draft of the script (December 8, 1966). Scott is referring to the controls of the Botany Bay, of course.

SCOTT
Completely automated. Hasn't been a human hand at
those controls for over a hundred years.

KIRK
What power, Scotty?

SCOTT
Atomic, for the most part. But they've added an ion particle
drive which is pretty advanced for her time. One of the first ones, I'd say.

KIRK
Then it could approach light speed?

SCOTT
Close to it.

The December 8 script would not be the final draft 9 December 1966,or the revised final draft 12 December 1966, or the second revised final draft 13 December 1966 and of course there may have been changes made while the episode was filmed before the scenes in the Botany Bay were filmed on 22 December 1966.

It is possible that the December 8 script has other historical references that may be inconsistent with the episode that was filmed and is canon.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I'm more than fine with the Botany Bay having been found in the vicinity of Alpha Ceti. Even though it requires the BB to have accelerated to near light speed, assuming she was not interfered with, it does more or less perfectly mesh with a 23rd century starting date for the events TOS.

On the other hand, maybe the BB was swept ahead by a magnetic space storm the way the Valiant was in WNMHGB, or something like that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_Ceti (distance about 250 light-years).

 

[Tenacity]

The Pioneer space probe was slow too, and yet it made it into Klingon space in only 300 years.

I took the scene of the BOP firing on the probe to indicate that the BOP was near Earth, and not that the probe was near the Empire. Maybe it was doing intelligence surveillance? It did pick up data (Vixis' words) on Nimbus Three.

And the Cryosatellite (a contemporary to the Botany Bay) was slow too, and it made it almost to the Neutral Zone in only 400 years.

Picard was at starbase 718, he traveled back by shuttle.

It is unknown where the Enterprise was located awaiting his return.

When Picard arrived back on the ship he ordered a course towards the RNZ at warp eight.

It appeared to take multiple days to reach the RNZ.

I don't think the satellite was near the RNZ, it easily could have been in Earth's star system.

Conjecture only.

The Enterprise was waiting for Picard somewhere in Earth's system. Picard was at SB-718 for a mission briefing. The Enterprise wasn't near SB-718. Picard had to travel back and forth by shuttle. SB-718 location is unknown, however Earth's system is a important one and could have multiple starbases scattered through it, providing different fuctions. The Enterprise was traveling to the RNZ from Earth's system at warp eight over the course of the majority of the episode, a trip of several days or even a few weeks. The satellite was found in Earth's system, for some reason it was traveling outwards from Earth.

 

[Dukhat]

the cryosatellite wasn't "slow", since it wasn't going anywhere. It would have been parked in a convenient orbit, around Earth or around the Sun, where it would be easy to get to when it would be possible to bring one or more of the occupants back to life.

The propulsion system of the cryosatellite doesn't matter since it wasn't intended to go anywhere, just to keep its station. Possibly some zany aliens thought it was fun to take primitive Earth probes and spaceships from our solar system to distant stars.

So let's talk about the Cryosatellite. I agree that as a 'satellite,' it was logically not meant to travel any farther than Earth's orbit, since it would be counterproductive to have a ship travelling away from the planet when the scientists trying to come up with the occupants' cures would still be on Earth. This of course strains the logic of why those people needed to be in space to begin with, as they could have just been frozen on Earth. But that's another story.

Anyway, the episode itself explains nothing. How did the Cryosatellite get that far out into interstellar space? Why did it have artificial gravity? What was the reason why it was even flying away from Earth, if it in fact did have a propulsion system? I understand that there was a cut scene like you described, with the crew conjecturing that aliens did steal the satellite, but since it wasn't in the final airing, there's really no logical reason for the scenario.

I took the scene of the BOP firing on the probe to indicate that the BOP was near Earth, and not that the probe was near the Empire. Maybe it was doing intelligence surveillance? It did pick up data (Vixis' words) on Nimbus Three.Picard was at starbase 718, he traveled back by shuttle.

In real life, by the 23rd century the Pioneer probe wouldn't have even traveled a fraction of a light year from the solar system. You mean to tell me that an armed, uncloaked enemy spacecraft was essentially in Earth's backyard flying around aimlessly, taking potshots at space debris, and the Federation didn't notice? Sorry, that strains credibility.

It is unknown where the Enterprise was located awaiting his return.

When Picard arrived back on the ship he ordered a course towards the RNZ at warp eight.

It appeared to take multiple days to reach the RNZ.

I don't think the satellite was near the RNZ, it easily could have been in Earth's star system.

There's nothing at all to indicate the Cryosatellite (or the Enterprise, for that matter) was anywhere near Earth when it was found. As a matter of fact, it was mentioned that the satellite was about to enter a binary star system.

 

[Mres_was_framed!]

I understand that there was a cut scene like you described, with the crew conjecturing that aliens did steal the satellite, but since it wasn't in the final airing, there's really no logical reason for the scenario

Since this episode was one of the first meant to foreshadow the Borg, the deleted scene could raise the question of whether the Borg were interested in the object, and why it was not assimilated.

 

[Dukhat]

Since this episode was one of the first meant to foreshadow the Borg, the deleted scene could raise the question of whether the Borg were interested in the object, and why it was not assimilated.

From what I understand, the two concepts were not mutually exclusive.

 

[Timo]

Going to Starbase 12 might simply have been the most convenient thing to do if it was on the Enterprise’s agenda anyway rather than going out of the way to go back to Earth.

Especially if Kirk was desperately trying to avoid drawing attention to the misadventure and to Khan's fate, just like he tried to hide Cochrane's in that other adventure where he also lost a woman entrusted to him.

I guess what this rules out is the Botany Bay being somewhere in the Oort cloud of Sol: such trivial hops were a matter of "seconds" in "Bread and Circuses", and would not have involved any schedule considerations.

If the Botany Bay managed to exceed .5c then it might have gotten a respectable distance from Earth. If the engines just stopped (for whatever reason) then the ship would continue on its way at whatever velocity it attained. And this is how the Enterprise would have found it and then could easily match the velocity to come alongside. And there is no mention of the ship adrift and tumbling out of control.

We could postulate an engine that has fairly low thrust, meaning slow interplanetary travel, but with an ability to sustain (and, so that the math really works out, perhaps increase!) that thrust indefinitely, resulting in eventual interstellar performance. The engines being off when our heroes meet the ship could be a malfunction; a case of the fuel, whatever it be, finally running out; or a case of the ship drifting for a very short while at her turnaround point, before starting to apply reverse thrust. The last would be a case of serendipity, though, there being no explanation why the ship would be more likely to run into our heroes during the brief turnaround than while she was under thrust. And why send out the CQ if this was just a routine turnaround? Because the cryopods were failing well before their supposed best-before date?

Question. Did the Enterprise go back and retrieve the Botany Bay hulk? Because the vessel that Khan's survivors were living in looks nothing like a Federation shuttlecraft and is similar in length to the BB! That or it's container like we see on the docks today?
JB

If we squint enough (or have access to backstage photos), we learn the hut in which Khan lives is actually a series of standard Starfleet containers of the sort seen in TMP. There's even the towing spine attached, although it's missing the workbee at the one end. Faint UFP logos are painted on the outside, too.

This is difficult to discern from the movie itself: there, all the elements of the hut that have Starfleet or UFP signage on them could have been imported later, rather than being part of the hut structure. But conversely, the only thing visibly from the Botany Bay is the cargo strap used for making the bookshelf; perhaps Khan took his beloved light reading with him when beaming over (odd that he didn't take weapons, say). We can interpret all this however we want to, but odds are Kirk never returned to the hulk.

Also, it's rather unlikely that Khan would have had any hut components aboard his ship. The idea of colonizing a planet seemed to surprise him when Kirk cleverly pushed it as "Khan's agenda all along"...

I took the scene of the BOP firing on the probe to indicate that the BOP was near Earth, and not that the probe was near the Empire. Maybe it was doing intelligence surveillance?

Me likes. And Klaa getting to Nimbus right after Kirk would then be a problem in one dimension. Although his intel gathering wouldn't get high marks if Kirk slipped out of Sol right under Klaa's nose!

Picard was at starbase 718, he traveled back by shuttle. It is unknown where the Enterprise was located awaiting his return.

Then again, we do learn that the satellite will "eventually" enter the Kazis binary system where it will be destroyed. That our heroes are concerned about this at all indicates that the trip there will take less than millions of years, and that there indeed is a good chance that if our heroes don't save the sat, nobody will.

Now, we can argue that lack of time is not the reason why nobody else will save the sat, even though its course is now known and will be known for the billennia to come. But if we already establish interstellar, we might just as well establish that SB 718 is in the Kazis system, a place so destructive that starships only send shuttles there instead of risking approach, and Starfleet holds its most secret conferences there for the very reason...

It appeared to take multiple days to reach the RNZ. I don't think the satellite was near the RNZ, it easily could have been in Earth's star system.

Sounds a bit complicated - why have Picard waste time traveling in a slow shuttle, then? But the damning fault IMHO there is the fact that the sat is interstellar already, that is, its destination is this specific other star system; we then benefit nothing from assuming the vicinity of Earth, since we shouldn't assume slow speeds.

FWIW, Picard seems to hold a conference the first thing after coming aboard, and at the end of that conference, it's a bit less than 20 hours to the RNZ.

SB-718 location is unknown, however Earth's system is a important one and could have multiple starbases scattered through it, providing different functions.

Not a bad idea at all. But if Earth has lots of resources, some of those could certainly be vectored in to take care of the cryosat. Instead, our heroes seem to feel it falls upon them to save or study the relic. Surely Riker would override that immediately in favor of Picard's expected mission if alternative sets of heroes were available.

So let's talk about the Cryosatellite. I agree that as a 'satellite,' it was logically not meant to travel any farther than Earth's orbit, since it would be counterproductive to have a ship travelling away from the planet when the scientists trying to come up with the occupants' cures would still be on Earth. This of course strains the logic of why those people needed to be in space to begin with, as they could have just been frozen on Earth. But that's another story.

Sounds natural enough. It's a sales pitch: don't let your beloved ones melt from a brownout, pay us top dollar to send them to space instead! It's only five hundred times more expensive than what the Joneses are doing, so why hesitate?

Also, it's pretty unlikely that anybody was actually trying to cure these folks. But sending the corpses outside the reach of putative help would not be part of the sales pitch for obvious reasons. Would the corporation behind it be doing so anyway? Probably not, as it's difficult to see a benefit, no matter how crooked.

Anyway, the episode itself explains nothing. How did the Cryosatellite get that far out into interstellar space?

Well, "speed" probably isn't involved. Data and Worf get aboard and back by beaming from the E-D, which Riker would obviously refuse to move for the purpose, even at impulse speeds. So the sat is likely to be drifting at an insignificant relative speed. Which further suggests that the risk of falling into the binary grinder involves very short distances, or else the immediacy would be totally lost.

Why did it have artificial gravity?

Because those are dirt cheap in the 1990s already? Everybody and their Pakled cousin has those. The real question is, why did Kelly turn his off in "One Small Step"?

What was the reason why it was even flying away from Earth, if it in fact did have a propulsion system?

I doubt we could reasonably postulate a drive system from the evidence given. It would have been a bit of a factor in the dialogue if it played a role in the sat's course and fate.

I understand that there was a cut scene like you described, with the crew conjecturing that aliens did steal the satellite, but since it wasn't in the final airing, there's really no logical reason for the scenario.

Except if alien abduction is commonplace, it really is the most logical explanation and warrants little mention...

In real life, by the 23rd century the Pioneer probe wouldn't have even traveled a fraction of a light year from the solar system. You mean to tell me that an armed, uncloaked enemy spacecraft was essentially in Earth's backyard flying around aimlessly, taking potshots at space debris, and the Federation didn't notice? Sorry, that strains credibility.

Well, it would be the Klingon thing to do! The cloak gets Klaa into the Middle Loch of Pearl Harbor unseen; he takes a few potshots at the Utah with his deck gun for the shits and giggles; and he's confident he can dive again before the USN or the CG can respond.

I mean, why wouldn't he be? A century later, Klingon cloakships can infiltrate the defenses of the Romulan home system and insert agents on Romulus itself.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Dukhat]

But that’s not how the BoP scene is played. Klaa and his crew are bored stiff, on an uncloaked ship, relieving the monotony by taking potshots at space junk. This is not the act of someone who is trying to test Earth’s defenses or conducting an intelligence gathering mission. And he’s not even trying to get the Federation’s attention, if in fact they are supposed to be right outside the Solar System, relatively speaking.

No, I’m pretty sure the scene was supposed to be taking place in Klingon space, and the Pioneer probe is just an anachronism that Bran Ferren or William Shatner didn’t give a second thought about.

Of course, since this movie postulates that both a Constitution class starship and a BoP can effectively travel to the center of the galaxy in about an hour (when it would have taken Picard’s Enterprise decades at maximum warp to accomplish the same thing), then the ‘speed’ of a 20th century Earth probe with no propulsion being able to make it all the way to the Klingon Empire in only 300 years becomes more plausible (and I’m using the word ‘plausible’ extremely lightly.)

 

[Mres_was_framed!]

From what I understand, the two concepts were not mutually exclusive.

If understand you correctly to mean that just because the Borg were interested enough in the object to move it but then abandoned it because it did not prove interesting to them, then I think that puts an interesting spin on the episode. Picard spend much of the episode acting as if he thinks these people are awful, and some on the forum have said that he he seems unusually stuck up about the 20th century in this case compare with what we see later, but he still allows them to be reawakened and let them learn about the 24th century. Right away, the Picard and the Borg are pitted against each other, one learning to confront the past, and the other ignoring it.

Of course, since this movie postulates that both a Constitution class starship and a BoP can effectively travel to the center of the galaxy in about an hour

How do we know how long Star Trek 5 takes? I don't recall a time factor being stated, but I could be wrong. Maybe it took weeks and the Enterprise was the fastest ship at the time with the Excelsior out of commission and not one could catch it but Klaa who was close behind? Maybe the Great Barrier is actually far out from the center of the Galaxy, but since it encircles the center, it was said to be "at the center of the Galaxy," and maybe "Sha Ka Ree," is actually not in the very center, and just within the Great Barrier.

While I'm at it, The FJSTM maps of the Galaxy refer to a "Safe Radiation Limit," presumably meaning that the center of the Galaxy has such strong radiation at its center that a ship could not explore. Perhaps what Sybok means when referring to the danger of the Barrier as imaginary is sort of what we see in the movie: in this view there really is no Barrier, and the "safe radiation limit" was a wrong assumption.

It's a HUGE stretch, but maybe all this makes Star Trek 5's travel time a bit less extreme.

I'm not sure how something like would apply the Botany Bay, though, for that I'm presently thinking Tau Ceti may have been the writer's intended original destination that was never reached for whatever reason and the Enterprise was traveling still in the general direction of what we call Cetus as viewed from Earth, and found it instead.

In stardate order, Space Seed is followed by Return of the Archons, and Kirk calls the Planet Beta III. Perhaps calling the planet Beta Ceti is what was intended? It may not work well with "real science" but if all the writing staff had was a star chart from Earth's perceptive, it is interesting that several episodes nearby to each other in time are around the constellation Cetus. Perhaps they wanted to imply planets nearby to each other and were just looking at it in a 2D sense?

 

[Tenacity]

Especially if Kirk was desperately trying to avoid drawing attention to the misadventure and to Khan's fate

I've never bought into the idea that Kirk kept the whole Khan affair secret. What would his original motivation be? Plus McGivers was gone from his crew, this would have to of been accounted for.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

I've never bought into the idea that Kirk kept the whole Khan affair secret. What would his original motivation be? Plus McGivers was gone from his crew, this would have to of been accounted for.

It's impossible to run a capital ship and keep what you do and where the ship goes a secret from headquarters. A PT boat with five men, maybe. But not a big ship. And that's not even to mention the automatic computer logs and sensor logs the Enterprise has, and even today's Navy ships surely have.

 

[Tenacity]

As a matter of fact, it was mentioned that the satellite was about to enter a binary star system.

Eventually.

 

[J.T.B.]

It's impossible to run a capital ship and keep what you do and where the ship goes a secret from headquarters.

Agreed.

Destroyer Captain Was Fired for Lying About Ship's Position: Navy Investigation

 

[Dukhat]

Eventually.

The dialogue indicated that it was going to be a recent event, since Data was concerned that the Cryosatellite would be destroyed if they didn’t explore it right then. If they had years before it reached the system, then Data wouldn’t have been so urgent about it.

 

[publiusr]

It does seem that a lot of early probes and such were given quite the boost by some phenomena...

 

[Forbin]

It does seem that a lot of early probes and such were given quite the boost by some phenomena...

Probably the same thing that let the Moon visit different solar systems after 1999.

 

[Mytran]

Probably the same thing that let the Moon visit different solar systems after 1999.

Yeah, that was a quite the crazy couple of years! Glad that space dragon came by and laid us a new one

 

[Tallguy]

Yeah, that was a quite the crazy couple of years! Glad that space dragon came by and laid us a new one

Wait. Which moon had the monolith?