When on patrol of a neutral zone, how far beyond the neutral zone can a federation starship scan? Can those scans be detected? How many neutral zones are there in the 24th century?
JDW
JDW
Sensor Scans?
- Thread starter James Wright
- Start date
There were two Neutral Zones in the 23rd-Century, one with the Romulan Empire and another later with the Klingons (according to Star Trek II and VI). But by TNG, the Klingon Neutral Zone was apparently abolished with the Khitomer Accords.
As far as scanning is concerned, there doesn't seem to be a physical limit for how far scans can go other than by the proximity of the scanner itself. Starship sensors seem to have a maximum range of 20 light-years or so, but I think the resolution isn't that great at that distance. A starship probably needs to get much closer to an object to get really detailed information.
I'm certain that both the Federation and the Romulans are aware of deep scans either side routinely performs, but as long as their ships stay on their respective side of the Neutral Zone, that's all that matters. Both Starfleet Intelligence and the Tal Shiar, however, probably have covert means of circumventing that though...
As far as scanning is concerned, there doesn't seem to be a physical limit for how far scans can go other than by the proximity of the scanner itself. Starship sensors seem to have a maximum range of 20 light-years or so, but I think the resolution isn't that great at that distance. A starship probably needs to get much closer to an object to get really detailed information.
I'm certain that both the Federation and the Romulans are aware of deep scans either side routinely performs, but as long as their ships stay on their respective side of the Neutral Zone, that's all that matters. Both Starfleet Intelligence and the Tal Shiar, however, probably have covert means of circumventing that though...
I don't see how there could really be a range limit on scans in space, since there are no horizons. Heck, the naked eye can see the Andromeda Galaxy, 3 million light-years away. Of course, we're seeing it as it was 3 million years ago.
If we're talking about FTL scans, I would think the main problem wouldn't be range so much as time delay. The farther out you're scanning, the longer it might take for whatever FTL energies or particles you're scanning for to reach your sensors -- especially if it's an active scan like radar, sending something out that bounces back, which would double the time lag with distance.
Hmm, on second thought, I suppose that with an active scan, there'd also be a power issue -- the farther away something is, the more intense your scan would have to be to "illuminate" it clearly enough. But again, there wouldn't be a specific cutoff distance there -- the sensor picture would just get fainter with increasing distance. How far would be too far to get a clear picture could depend on various factors, such as the power of your sensors, the size and reflectivity of the object being scanned, the conditions of space or subspace that might create interference, etc.
Anyway, the range of a sensor scan is as plot-dependent as anything else in ST. There have been episodes asserting the ability of starship sensors to detect activity beyond the far edge of the Romulan Neutral Zone, but the technical specifics have never been defined, especially since the depiction of the NZ itself has been inconsistent. (The writer of "The Deadly Years" seemed to think the NZ was part of Romulan Territory, since he had at least ten Birds of Prey patrolling within the zone itself, which is supposed to be a no-no.) Similarly, there have been episodes asserting the ability to make detailed sensor scans of planets several parsecs away, and others asserting the inability of long-range sensors to detect things much closer. As with all Trek tech questions, you can make up some arbitrary answer, but there are bound to be episodes or movies that contradict it.
If we're talking about FTL scans, I would think the main problem wouldn't be range so much as time delay. The farther out you're scanning, the longer it might take for whatever FTL energies or particles you're scanning for to reach your sensors -- especially if it's an active scan like radar, sending something out that bounces back, which would double the time lag with distance.
Hmm, on second thought, I suppose that with an active scan, there'd also be a power issue -- the farther away something is, the more intense your scan would have to be to "illuminate" it clearly enough. But again, there wouldn't be a specific cutoff distance there -- the sensor picture would just get fainter with increasing distance. How far would be too far to get a clear picture could depend on various factors, such as the power of your sensors, the size and reflectivity of the object being scanned, the conditions of space or subspace that might create interference, etc.
Anyway, the range of a sensor scan is as plot-dependent as anything else in ST. There have been episodes asserting the ability of starship sensors to detect activity beyond the far edge of the Romulan Neutral Zone, but the technical specifics have never been defined, especially since the depiction of the NZ itself has been inconsistent. (The writer of "The Deadly Years" seemed to think the NZ was part of Romulan Territory, since he had at least ten Birds of Prey patrolling within the zone itself, which is supposed to be a no-no.) Similarly, there have been episodes asserting the ability to make detailed sensor scans of planets several parsecs away, and others asserting the inability of long-range sensors to detect things much closer. As with all Trek tech questions, you can make up some arbitrary answer, but there are bound to be episodes or movies that contradict it.
All Seeing Eye
Admiral
Which brings up a question, how do we know the Andromeda galaxy is still there? for all we know all its stars have gone supernova because an evil alien race used a deadly weapon.
I don't think we do "know" it's still there. Except perhaps some gravitational effect, but IANAA, and I have no idea how/if gravity is bound to the speed of light, or if Andromada even has any gravitational effect on a scale we can observe.
And a related link:http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3w.html
It's not Star Trek, but an interesting read nonetheless.
And a related link:http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3w.html
It's not Star Trek, but an interesting read nonetheless.
Well, first off... there is really no such thing as a "sensor scan." Sensors are PASSIVE devices, while scanners are ACTIVE devices. Two classifications of devices, two terms.
Radar or sonar are examples of scanners. They send out an active signal, then measure changes to the reflection of that signal to tell about things happening remotely. Cameras are examples of sensors... they don't interact with their environment, they simply receive energy from the environment which tells them about what's going on around them.
As for the range... that's totally indeterminate and unsupported either by anything scientific or anything scripted. Ultimately, the range is "as far as the writer wants it to be."
That said... for real-time measurements, you have electromagnetic and particle-based systems (both passive sensors and active scanners). So you can sort of determine the range based upon some real physics, if you really want to. For instance, we can determine with a fair degree of detail, from here, what the composition of a star is (or rather what it was when the light leaving it was originally emitted, many years ago). And we can determine the relative velocity of that star to our own system, allowing us to interpolate the CURRENT position of that star. So, really, "range" is not a simple cut-off, but rather a "how accurate can you be at a given range?" scale.
As for SCANNERS, that's going to have a more distinct cut-off range... but again, the performance will decrease as distance increases. If you assume that most scanners operate over a "subspace domain" (meaning that they use conventional particles or waves but in FTL-capable space), you can "guestimate" the range, but it's really all guesswork. If you assume scanners operate using FTL particles (tachyons), you can determine exactly the effective range of those scanners... IF, and ONLY IF, you know a lot more about tachyons than we do today!
Basically... we lack the information and technical knowledge (I mean, we, the entire human race!) to answer that question in any plausible fashion.
SO... the ONLY answer is "the sensors are as effective as the writer makes them."
I don't think Epsilon 9 was like the Neutral Zone outposts ravaged in Balance of Terror. I think its primary purpose was a communications relay station, as it was very busy sending messages back and forth to Starships out in the field, as well as referring to itself as "Comm-Station Epsilon 9" in all its messages. But I am sure Epsilon 9 did their fair share of "cup to the wall" monitoring activities. Since they were a node in the Federation communications network, it only stands to reason that signals from unmanned sensor and intelligence drones would go through them to reach Starfleet authorities. This is evidenced by the Klingon/V'Ger Cloud scene.
Of course Epsilon 9 might already be considered outdated in a way by today's standards, as (at least on some occasions) they actually read dispatches from Starfleet to the Starships receiving orders, rather than just picking up signals and boosting them on to their destinations. Some might see that as archaic, though some might find some logical reason behind it; The need to maintain human connections and the psychological like.
Gravity is limited to the speed of light, although Trek has been known to assume its effects are instantaneous (see Generations). There is a small fringe of physicists who believe gravity acts instantaneously, but the evidence they cite has been satisfactorily explained in lightspeed terms.
And yes, Andromeda does have a gravitational effect on the Milky Way and vice-versa. The two galaxies are converging and will collide in 2-3 billion years.
OTOH, Sternbach and Okuda have suggested from the TNG Tech Manual onwards that signals forced into the FTL realm don't stay there forever. For subspace signals sent by a Galaxy class transmitter, there is a very sharp cutoff distance of 22.65 lightyears (at maximum power; lower settings give less distance), after which FTL signals degrade to either STL signals or possibly STL noise. Other types of transmitter may have different cutoff distances, allowing for the quoted sensor ranges of starships or fixed installations, as well as for those instances where lesser ships such as runabouts are able to fly to such a distance from the home base that communications cease to be instantaneous/FTL.
Of course, those dastardly Romulans would be just the sort of people to commit a no-no.
(Indeed, that's what we saw them doing when we first met them!)
There must be dozens of examples of where this makes no sense, but in general we could say that sensor/scanner analysis of a planet can indeed be conducted much beyond the range of active scanners. For example, a planet is likely to stay Class M and industrialized etc. even if the information is outdated by a few decades or centuries due to lightspeed time lag. And a scanner that can deduce the composition of a planetary atmosphere need not have the ability to observe a tiny starship at one-hundredth the distance.
Timo Saloniemi
...In the 24th century?
In ST6, they suggest that the Klingon NZ be disbanded. No real reason to think it wasn't. And in early TNG, our heroes always seem to speak of one NZ only, the Romulan one.
Of course, since the Feds so enjoy creating these buffer zones, there could really be dozens if not hundreds in the 24th century. One on the Talarian border, one against the Tzenkethi, one to keep the Tholians at bay... Just because we never hear of these doesn't mean they wouldn't exist.
Then again, there apparently wasn't one on the Cardassian border - the nature of the separate Demilitarized Zone arrangement seems to exclude that possibility.
Timo Saloniemi
In ST6, they suggest that the Klingon NZ be disbanded. No real reason to think it wasn't. And in early TNG, our heroes always seem to speak of one NZ only, the Romulan one.
Of course, since the Feds so enjoy creating these buffer zones, there could really be dozens if not hundreds in the 24th century. One on the Talarian border, one against the Tzenkethi, one to keep the Tholians at bay... Just because we never hear of these doesn't mean they wouldn't exist.
Then again, there apparently wasn't one on the Cardassian border - the nature of the separate Demilitarized Zone arrangement seems to exclude that possibility.
Timo Saloniemi
Hmmm.. I might disagree with that.
* The Romulan Neutral Zone is the usually "the Neutral Zone". The Klingon Neutral Zone is a bit iffy, only mentioned in 2 movies, one of which taking place in a computer simulation. In the simulation, the neutral zone is the shape of an egg, and not something that looks like a border between the UFP and the Klingons. And technically, I'm not sure they ever really say the words "Klingon neutral zone". Just "the neutral zone", which may involve more than just Klingons. Possibilities could be the zone around Nimbus 3, or the zone around Organia.
* In early TNG, the Klingons were basically regarded members (or very close allies) of the Federation. There's at least one example of a Klingon bridge sporting the Federation emblem, and there's of course Worf, who in the first few episodes was possibly a 'generic Klingon officer', instead of the outcast troubled Klingon he was later understood to be. Anyway.. there's certainly no Klingon neutral zone in this era, since we made peace with them.
* The Romulan Neutral Zone is the usually "the Neutral Zone". The Klingon Neutral Zone is a bit iffy, only mentioned in 2 movies, one of which taking place in a computer simulation. In the simulation, the neutral zone is the shape of an egg, and not something that looks like a border between the UFP and the Klingons. And technically, I'm not sure they ever really say the words "Klingon neutral zone". Just "the neutral zone", which may involve more than just Klingons. Possibilities could be the zone around Nimbus 3, or the zone around Organia.
* In early TNG, the Klingons were basically regarded members (or very close allies) of the Federation. There's at least one example of a Klingon bridge sporting the Federation emblem, and there's of course Worf, who in the first few episodes was possibly a 'generic Klingon officer', instead of the outcast troubled Klingon he was later understood to be. Anyway.. there's certainly no Klingon neutral zone in this era, since we made peace with them.
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