Self Destruct.

[dispatcher812]

So I am sitting here at work, having one of those days and thought about the self destruct and the hierarchy of it. Lets say that all you had left on the ship were junior officers for whatever reason. Would an ensign be in command if he or she was the highest officer and could he or she and his next in line set the auto destruct? Saying you need two people at that point.

 

[infinix]

I don't have any facts, but I believe there are always two sets of bridge crews and any combination of any two bridge crew can set off the auto-destruct.

In the event that both bridge crews are completely wiped out, then the ship is probably about to be destroyed anyway. In that case, I believe the compute would take over and initiate a self-destruct to prevent the ship from being captured by the enemy.

 

[TiberiusMaximus]

^I don't think that's how it would work. Starfleet would not kill the rest of the crew simply because the bridge crews were gone. If they have a chance to escape, it's their right to try as hard as they can. Starfleet wouldn't simply sacrifice them.

 

[Subcommander R.]

Thats interesting. I would assume the internal sensors inform the computer of who is alive. So in theory if the computer knew the Captain and XO were dead, then the authority would fall on the 2nd mate and whoever is 3rd.

Just speculation of course.

 

[Vanyel]

Or they could fire a phaser directly at the warp core like what the Klingon wanted to do in Heart of Glory.

 

[TiberiusMaximus]

^I've actually thought of that too, as a measure of last resort.

Computer: Self-Destruct is offline.

Captain: Screw it, I'm going to engineering. It's been an honor serving with you.

KABOOM

 

[Timo]

We know two (TNG) or three (TOS) top officers can order self-destruct. We never hear other officers couldn't do the same, though. Quite possibly some 75% of the officers aboard have the necessary codewords and can implement the procedure, while a select few officers and all the crew are relieved of this responsibility because deciding the fate of the ship isn't in their job description.

This would hardly present any practical problems. If three guys from Deck Eleven went mad and ordered countdown to self-destruct, any three other guys could countermand it with their own codes; we've never heard of a countdown-less destruct sequence, after all. OTOH, if three cowards from Deck Eleven tried to countermand the brave suicide decision of Kirk, Spock and Scotty, the computer would recognize their lower status in the hierarchy and block their attempt.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[infinix]

^I don't think that's how it would work. Starfleet would not kill the rest of the crew simply because the bridge crews were gone. If they have a chance to escape, it's their right to try as hard as they can. Starfleet wouldn't simply sacrifice them.

The only real reason to self-destruct is so that the ship doesn't fall into enemy hands. If whoever with sufficient command authority orders self-destruct (and wasn't countered by anyone else) we can safely assume that the vessel is either in the heat of battle or has had all hands abandon ship already.

The computers on Federation ships are given a lot of autonomous authority in deciding what should be done in which circumstances. The argument that the crew should be given every chance to escape doesn't effect who issues the order to self destruct. If a captain orders the self-destruct with all hands on board the vessel, he must have a good reason. It can be argued that the computer, given the same situation to make a choice, can and will arrive at the same conclusion.

 

[Vanyel]

We know two (TNG) or three (TOS) top officers can order self-destruct. We never hear other officers couldn't do the same, though. Quite possibly some 75% of the officers aboard have the necessary codewords and can implement the procedure, while a select few officers and all the crew are relieved of this responsibility because deciding the fate of the ship isn't in their job description.

This would hardly present any practical problems. If three guys from Deck Eleven went mad and ordered countdown to self-destruct, any three other guys could countermand it with their own codes; we've never heard of a countdown-less destruct sequence, after all. OTOH, if three cowards from Deck Eleven tried to countermand the brave suicide decision of Kirk, Spock and Scotty, the computer would recognize their lower status in the hierarchy and block their attempt.

Timo Saloniemi

Or three officers not under alien control could not save the ship.

 

[Vanyel]

^I don't think that's how it would work. Starfleet would not kill the rest of the crew simply because the bridge crews were gone. If they have a chance to escape, it's their right to try as hard as they can. Starfleet wouldn't simply sacrifice them.

The only real reason to self-destruct is so that the ship doesn't fall into enemy hands. If whoever with sufficient command authority orders self-destruct (and wasn't countered by anyone else) we can safely assume that the vessel is either in the heat of battle or has had all hands abandon ship already.

The computers on Federation ships are given a lot of autonomous authority in deciding what should be done in which circumstances. The argument that the crew should be given every chance to escape doesn't effect who issues the order to self destruct. If a captain orders the self-destruct with all hands on board the vessel, he must have a good reason. It can be argued that the computer, given the same situation to make a choice, can and will arrive at the same conclusion.

Or self destruct could be used as a last attempt to destroy an enemy ship.

 

[Timo]

The only real reason to self-destruct is so that the ship doesn't fall into enemy hands.

And while that may be a necessary reason, it's not yet a sufficient reason. Picard didn't attempt to destroy the Stargazer after losing her to an enemy attack in space that wasn't claimed by the UFP and probably was claimed by the enemy. He was cleared of (unspecified) charges in a court martial nevertheless.

Kirk never tried to blow himself up, either. It was always pure bluff, or then Kirk had an escape plan worked out. The one time his officers tried to suggest blowing up for real, Kirk's exact line was "Are you mad?!"...

Considering this, I don't think Starfleet is too worried about failures in the self-destruct systems or protocols. If self-destruct works, fine. If it doesn't, too bad. Probably it would only be really needed in a case where the ship poses a hazard (is on a collision course to a friendly party, or something) and has to be disposed of for that reason...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Timo]

Or three officers not under alien control could not save the ship.

That is certainly as it should be. In cases of dispute, the people Starfleet trusts more (the ones with higher rank and/or position) will have to triumph even if they happen to be possessed, mad or drunk. That's the only safe bet Starfleet can make; there can never be any provision for underlings to undermine their superiors. If the ships are built so that they can be easily controlled by underlings, then they should probably all be blown up preemptively to prevent misuse.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[infinix]

Or three officers not under alien control could not save the ship.

That is certainly as it should be. In cases of dispute, the people Starfleet trusts more (the ones with higher rank and/or position) will have to triumph even if they happen to be possessed, mad or drunk. That's the only safe bet Starfleet can make; there can never be any provision for underlings to undermine their superiors. If the ships are built so that they can be easily controlled by underlings, then they should probably all be blown up preemptively to prevent misuse.

Timo Saloniemi

Is it always a possibility that a superior officer can be relieved of his/her authority for a range of reasons? Like a doctor could declare someone unfit to serve? and a great example is when Captain Picard arrested Admiral Pressman in "The Pegasus." Here we have a subordinate officer arresting a superior officer and neutralized all command functions of the superior officer.

(While I don't remember if we ever saw Picard explicitly order the computer to cease accepting orders from Pressman, we have to logically assume that happens. Otherwise, Pressman can just order the ship's computer to transport every other senior office directly to the brig)

 

[TiberiusMaximus]

^I don't think that's how it would work. Starfleet would not kill the rest of the crew simply because the bridge crews were gone. If they have a chance to escape, it's their right to try as hard as they can. Starfleet wouldn't simply sacrifice them.

The only real reason to self-destruct is so that the ship doesn't fall into enemy hands. If whoever with sufficient command authority orders self-destruct (and wasn't countered by anyone else) we can safely assume that the vessel is either in the heat of battle or has had all hands abandon ship already.

The computers on Federation ships are given a lot of autonomous authority in deciding what should be done in which circumstances. The argument that the crew should be given every chance to escape doesn't effect who issues the order to self destruct. If a captain orders the self-destruct with all hands on board the vessel, he must have a good reason. It can be argued that the computer, given the same situation to make a choice, can and will arrive at the same conclusion.

I think you misunderstand my point...I probably should have worded it better. My point was merely having the bridge crew and the backup bridge crew(s) incapacitated would not in itself make the computer decide to self-destruct.

It's not consistent with Starfleet's code of ethics to kill most of the crew ONLY because the bridge crew is dead. In an extreme situation, the computer might choose a self-destruct. But the situation would need to be pretty freakin' hopeless. A lot of command functions can be routed to Engineering, and, I imagine, other places. So the Bridge Crew's unfortunate demise would not necessarily be the end of the ship.

Even when the Captain orders self-destruct, the crew usually abandons ship in the escape pods. The same would apply if the computer made that decision.

 

[Timo]

It's still quite relevant that self-destruct is virtually never necessary. It's a handy tool for blackmail, and it can cleanly terminate any nasties that happen to overrun or otherwise infest the vessel, but there are very few situations where failure to self-destruct would lead to dire consequences. It thus sounds dubious that the computer would be given the authority to decide on the matter under any circumstances, considering the computer AFAWK isn't allowed to make medical decisions or choose whether to fire phasers at the enemy.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

Kirk never tried to blow himself up

Towards the end of TMP, Kirk calls Scotty and tell him that if kirk doesn't call him back within a certain number of minutes to execute order 2005, the three big bridge officers were off the ship and there was perhaps no one to formally instruct the main computer to destroy the ship. So Kirk just told Scotty to do it himself, which I'm sure any Starfleet chief engineer could have done without the computer's assistance.

It wasn't a bluff, Kirk would have used his beloved Enterprise's stocks of antimatter to take out V'Ger.

 

[Maxillius]

Picard tried to blow up E-E to make a dent in the Scimitar, but self-destruct went on holiday.

You would think self-destruct would be easier to do once the ship was out of torpedoes.


On that note, WhyTF didn't Picard back off the Scimitar to let the phaser capacitors recharge??

 

[Vanyel]

^^^^^Not enough time for them to recharge? or they were damaged by the impact? The phasers were out of position for use.

 

[Maxillius]

Umm, at that point the Scimitar was 1000 meters away straight ahead. Point blank range for both dorsal and ventral forward phasers. And, before the ramming, both arrays were intact.

 

[Vanyel]

The phaser arrays being intact doesn't mean they were undamaged and/or still functional. Also the phasers were at 4% (I don't know if that means they had enough power to send a full powered burst, or if the banks were only at 4% power and therefore very weak. To me, the dialog suggests the latter.), I'm not really sure how much damage they could have done or how long they could have sustained fire, if they could have fired. In any event, Enterprise suffered considerable damage, I doubt the phaser, or at the very least their power relays, were undamaged.