Size of starfleet?

[TheRoyalFamily]

Which is less than helpful in establishing Starfleet numbers, but at least it rules out the very high ones.

Not necessarily. Space is big. A single sector is 8000 cubic light years! The Federation is made up of a lot of sectors, and Starfleet operates even outside of that. A hundred thousand ships might not be near enough to do everything Starfleet is supposed to do.

Of course, there might be 50k Oberth-class ships making up the bulk of Starfleet, who knows?

 

[Crazyewok]

Not quite, because the vehicles I'm talking about would be small short-range craft that probably wouldn't be counted as starships.

To me that all comes under auxiliary craft.

 

[Crazyewok]

Which is less than helpful in establishing Starfleet numbers, but at least it rules out the very high ones.

Not necessarily. Space is big. A single sector is 8000 cubic light years! The Federation is made up of a lot of sectors, and Starfleet operates even outside of that. A hundred thousand ships might not be near enough to do everything Starfleet is supposed to do.

Of course, there might be 50k Oberth-class ships making up the bulk of Starfleet, who knows?

Thats the thing. We think say 20,000 is high but in a 8000 light year area plus more outside exploring that really is not much!

When dealing with such vast amounts of space, high takes on a new meaning.

Not when if you think about it the majority would be auxiliary craft that would not be capable or have limited combat capability so would not be first responders anyway.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Not quite, because the vehicles I'm talking about would be small short-range craft that probably wouldn't be counted as starships.

To me that all comes under auxiliary craft.

Which is exactly what I said earlier, but such vehicles also include shuttles and other small craft limited to impulse or low-warp speeds. They wouldn't be regarded as ships, IMO. The number of actual starships in the fleet wouldn't be anywhere near 20,000.

 

[Belz...]

The size of Starfleet has always depended on the story at hand, IMO.

Precisely. As with everything else, in fact.

Watching TOS, movies and TNG, you'd think Starfleet was either pretty small or at least that the distance between ships was huge. Of course budged had a lot to do with that. With DS9, things changed, to say the least.

 

[Timo]

Thats the thing. We think say 20,000 is high but in a 8000 light year area plus more outside exploring that really is not much!

But the other thing there is that we know that the single hero ship we so closely observe can go from one end of that area to another in a reasonably short time. Surely most of the ships of Starfleet would be capable of that, and thus the area really isn't all that big in practical terms.

Basically, even if we ignore all sorts of high outliers, both TOS and TNG vessels are capable of covering hundreds of lightyears between episodes (we hear references to specific distances every now and then, and to specific real locations slightly more often). Even if this doesn't happen quite within the two weeks between airdates, we can argue on "stardate" or "length of season" basis that a thousand lightyears per year is the absolute low end of performance. This would basically let a fleet ten thousand strong control UFP well enough to meet the onscreen evidence and the needs of drama.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Crazyewok]

This would basically let a fleet ten thousand strong control UFP well enough to meet the onscreen evidence and the needs of drama.

Timo Saloniemi

Well ten thousand is not far off my estimate.

I mean not when you factor in auxillary craft which could include all sorts from Dillithium tankers to short range shuttles that transport Starfleet officers and Enlisted from planet to planet and station to station ect.


I think Front line capital ships would number around 2500-5000 with half of which being in mothball dureing times of piece.

 

[The Wormhole]

I have always wondered this.

In Ent it seems there is 1 and later 2 long range ships and a dozen or so short range vessels like the intrepid. As far as registration numbers go we see NX-01 and 02. Yet there are otherships that were built before hand like as I said the intrepid (what would their reg number be?)

My understanding with Enterprise is that each starship class had its own registry label. Since the Enterprise and Columbia were NX class, their registries were NX-01, NX-02. The other ships would have registries based on their class. EG, I think popular fan conjecture makes the Intrepid NY-01 or something.

EDIT: Although I don't know where I got that from. I just did a quick check on some other sites, and the only thing I can come up with is the Sarajevo from the episode Daedalus had the registry NC-27 in its design sketches.

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

I work from idea that the big capital ships (Ambassador, Galaxy, Nebula, Sovereign) are relatively light in the fleet, with the bulk of it being made up by mid-sized multifuntion ships (which is why the Excelsior-Class is so prevanent) as well as small cruisers and scouts.

that and the fact they already had model handy when next gen started

That was very convenient

 

[QCzar]

The question should be phrased as two distinct ones:

1) How many ships would an organization like Starfleet need to administer the area its stated to cover in practical terms?

2) How many ships can be deduced to exist from on-screen evidence?

I think the answer to those two questions is quite different.

Regarding smaller ships not being considered "ships", I think DS9 reliably resolved that conundrum via the runabouts. And there are just as small ships in the real world that are still designated as fully commissioned naval vessels (though this is rare in larger navies). However, given the established role (or rather, multirole capabilities) of the Danube class, they may very well be exceptions for ships that small.

Additionally, the Nash (DS9) establishes that something as simple as a transport can still be a fully commissioned starship.

By the way, just for reference, there are ~2,500-3,000 warships on Earth total. There are tens of thousands of other support vessels used by world navies and governments. I'd guess that breakdown would work for the UFP as well, given their FTL capabilities. (this is in regards to question 1)

 

[Crazyewok]

In DS9 there seems to be around 5 ships around in the Area of DS9 (prewar) being a day or so away from it at most. Also in redemption they seemed to be able to assemble 5 ships at pretty short notice.

I thing that it be quite reasoble to assume that you could see a denisity on the borders of around 5 starships per 10 light years square.

Inside the fedeartion that would most likely drop 1-2 per 20 light years.

And also out side the federation you would find ships out on there own with backup much further away.

This does not include Auxillary ships though.


As far as those 5 ships go Im guessing and this is pure speculation! That you would find 1 battleship like ships a Galaxly/Nebula/Ambassador/Sovereign, 2 Crusiers either a Excelsior/Cheyenne/Niagra/Akira/Steamrunner/Norway. And 2 Frigates like Mirandas/Sabre/Freedom/Constellation/Defiant. This wing would be commanded by a Rear Admiral or/and a comadore/senoir captain.

Though Im sure the composition would change depending in the area and situtaion and that they would be brought together to form larger fleets when needed.

 

[MacLeod]

The size of Starfleet could vary somewhat. With a large number of inactive reserve ships to call upon if needed. We know there is a reserve activation clause for personnel so they can recall people back to man the ships.

 

[Crazyewok]

The size of Starfleet could vary somewhat. With a large number of inactive reserve ships to call upon if needed. We know there is a reserve activation clause for personnel so they can recall people back to man the ships.

Well it is stated in undiscoverd country that ships and stations can be moth balled.


So the borders could be like I said above have a very low denisty of ships but in extrem circumstances mothballed ships can be reactivated and brought in to increase the number of ships. So that wing of 5 ships could go to 10.

 

[Faria]

it depends by federation size and ships purpose.

Am i the only one who think that to have only one register code (NCC) for all the ship, indipendently by their purpose, is silly?

 

[MacLeod]

Haven't we seen none Starfleet vessels with different registries? It might that during wartime the Federation can call upon these and covert them to military service.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Regarding smaller ships not being considered "ships", I think DS9 reliably resolved that conundrum via the runabouts. And there are just as small ships in the real world that are still designated as fully commissioned naval vessels (though this is rare in larger navies). However, given the established role (or rather, multirole capabilities) of the Danube class, they may very well be exceptions for ships that small.

Additionally, the Nash (DS9) establishes that something as simple as a transport can still be a fully commissioned starship.

The definition of a starship changed somewhat between TOS and TNG, where it was earlier referred to as a special type of vessel (separate from cruisers and freighters), to it ultimately becoming a more generic term for any long-range vessel.

Even so, I think there are vehicles in Starfleet's inventory that do not classify as "starships," but rather as "craft" due to being small and/or having a very limited operational range.

 

[Captain Nebula]

Well it is stated in undiscoverd country that ships and stations can be moth balled.

And it took Starfleet 20 years before they built a new Enterprise after the Enterprise-C was destroyed, but only a few years between Ent-D and Ent-E. So I would think the political environment (a treaty with the Klingons) would have a big effect on on what kind of ships and how many were built. The Borg became a big enough threat that they created the Defiant and Sovereign classes to combat them. A threat that didn't exist 20 years prior. The Romulans were missing for years. The Enterprise-D was built for deep space exploration, not long, drawn out battles.

 

[Crazyewok]

Well it is stated in undiscoverd country that ships and stations can be moth balled.

And it took Starfleet 20 years before they built a new Enterprise after the Enterprise-C was destroyed. So I would think the political environment (a treaty with the Klingons) would have a big effect on on what kind of ships and how many were built.

Well duering that time the war with the Tskanthi and Cardasians broke out.

So rather than build a fancy new Galaxy Class they may have concentrated on ships for those wars with the Galaxy class project put as low priority.

 

[Timo]

A 20-year wait in launching a new Enterprise is in no way an indication of any waiting in shipbuilding. Enterprise is just a name - it may or may not be slapped onto a starship. When the E-B was lost, a modern successor was probably launched immediately; it just didn't happen to be named Enterprise.

Really, there's nothing to indicate that the E-C was a successor of the E-B; that the E-D was a successor of the E-C; or that the E-E was a successor of the E-D. Ambassadors did not go out of service when Galaxies were introduced; Galaxies didn't necessarily even go out of production when Sovereigns were introduced; and there's nothing to indicate that an Enterprise with a higher suffix letter would have inherited the mission of the preceding Enterprise.

Timo saloniemi

 

[C.E. Evans]

Well it is stated in undiscoverd country that ships and stations can be moth balled.

And it took Starfleet 20 years before they built a new Enterprise after the Enterprise-C was destroyed, but only a few years between Ent-D and Ent-E.

It's likely closer to just one year. The Enterprise-D was presumably destroyed in 2371 and the Enterprise-E was launched in 2372 (which would validate LaForge's comment in First Contact that the ship had been in service for nearly a year already).

As far as the long period of time between the Enterprise-C and the Enterprise-D, that could be a result of Starfleet wanting to honor the loss of that ship and its crew for awhile before launching her successor (even so, Starfleet may have announced early on that the Enterprise name would eventually continue with a new ship of the then only proposed Galaxy-class).