Yeah, "bird of prey" is a mistranslation. The full Klingon is "chi'Qen" means "bird of praying that they don't see us!"^And hiding behind a cloak like a space chicken
Well, when you consider they might have Bird-of-Prey type ships in the TOS era, then they might not have the need for a shuttlecraft, because the ship itself could land. Just a thought.
They had BOP type ships in ENT, so there must have been something similar in the TOS era, we just didn't see them.
Some D7 blueprints out there have that box at the top rear of the ship designated as a shuttlebay. Pretty much the only place it could be. http://www.cygnus-x1.net/links/lcars/sd-ktinga.php
Us TOS grognards are not blinkered, we just know what we like and what we dont.
"There'll be a kh'ex (translation "fuck up") on the landing bay" was the comment I think!!John M. Ford's old novels made good mileage on the well-known shortcomings of TOS, and one of his creative interpretations was that Klingons had much better transporters than humans. Why, the Klingon unit made no sound in "Day of the Dove"! With the superior transporters, Klingons just didn't see much need to drag out the clumsy old shuttles, and expressed disbelief and distrust at the human willingness to use those.
Onscreen Trek hasn't exactly contradicted the idea. We see precious few Klingon shuttles or planetfalls by Klingon spacecraft, and their ENT transporters appear to be routine gear while Archer is making the first experiments at transporting live people in field conditions.
That said, no, no Klingon shuttles in TOS or in TAS, but nothing to contradict their existence, either. It's not as if we'd have seen human/Fed shuttles all that often, either. Until TAS, that is.
Timo Saloniemi
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