Build date of the original U.S.S. Enterprise

[Shark]

One thing that has bothered me about modern Trek literature is that the build date of the original U.S.S. Enterprise (NCC-1701) is stated as being 2245. Why is that? The first suggestion of the Enterprises age is in TOS "The Menagerie", where it is stated that Spock and Pike served aboard the Enterprise together for eleven years, so with that information, we can safely surmise that the ship is at least eleven years old as of season one of TOS, which would give a minimum build date of 2254. Which is assuming that "The Menagerie" is set in 2265. And not counting the time in which Kirk has been in command. That's also assuming it was the same Enterprise for all eleven years. The ships age isn't referenced again until Star Trek III, where it is stated as being twenty years old.

Here are all the specific references I could think of for the age of the original Enterprise:

- TOS "The Menagerie"; it is stated that Spock and Pike served aboard the Enterprise for eleven years.(We might assume season one is set in 2265, as the series was supposed to take place three hundred years from the episode air date)

- In Star Trek II it is stated that it's been fifteen years since Kirk's first encounter with Khan in "Space seed"(TOS).

- Star Trek III dialog specifically states that the Enterprise is 20 years old.


If only a short period of time has passed since the battle with Khan in Star Trek II, and we know from dialog in Star Trek II that it's been fifteen years since "Space Seed", and dialog from Star Trek III states the ship is twenty years old, then the Enterprise would have only been around for five (or so) years preceding it's encounter with Khan in "Space Seed". That gives us an approximate time line starting around 2260, which conflicts with the line from "The Menagerie". I think the best date for the ships age is in "The Menagerie", since that was the first mention of it. A build date of 2245 would make the Enterprise twenty years old as of 2265, which of course would make it forty years old by the movies, which conflicts with movie dialog. Nowhere has it been stated on screen just exactly how old the ship is or when it was built, but since 2245 conflicts with existing dialog, I think that build date should be discarded.

I submit that the most appropriate build date, given all the dialog, is 2254. Yes it conflicts a little with the movies but it is the best year to allow for everything.

While I'll admit the reasoning that TOS started in 2265 is a bit shaky, I think that with Star Trek II stating specifically that it is set in the 23rd century and dialog within the movies lining up with dates in the 2260's, I think the year range is pretty close.

 

[Timo]

Nowhere has it been stated on screen just exactly how old the ship is or when it was built, but since 2245 conflicts with existing dialog, I think that build date should be discarded.

I don't see the point, since the only dialog in conflict with that date is already wholly unacceptable and must itself be discarded.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Avro Arrow]

We might assume season one is set in 2265, as the series was supposed to take place three hundred years from the episode air date

Which would actually make it set in 2266, then.

I submit that the most appropriate build date, given all the dialog, is 2254. Yes it conflicts a little with the movies but it is the best year to allow for everything.

Spock and Pike served together for eleven years and change, but "The Menagerie" explicitly states that the events they are seeing from the Talos IV incident were thirteen years ago. This means the Enterprise has to be in service by 2253, or 2252 if going by your 2265 date. And is there anything in "The Cage" that makes you think the Enterprise had just entered service at that point?

If you take TAS "The Counter-Clock Incident" into account, then Robert April commanded the Enterprise before Pike. I think 2245 works just fine, in that it gives the ship a bit of history, and leaves room for all the on-screen commanders we've seen.

Bottom line is that Morrow's "twenty years old" line is an error. Whether you want to say it is just a scriptwriter mistake, or a mistake the character made, is up to you, but it is observably false and should be discarded.

 

[Galileo7]

...
Bottom line is that Morrow's "twenty years old" line is an error. Whether you want to say it is just a scriptwriter mistake, or a mistake the character made, is up to you, but it is observably false and should be discarded.

I just think it is a reference to the Refit 1701 age rounded up to twenty years which is not accurate itself.
1701 age vs. 1701-Refit age

 

[Avro Arrow]

I just think it is a reference to the Refit 1701 age rounded up to twenty years which is not accurate itself.
1701 age vs. 1701-Refit age

That's a valid interpretation, but as you note, the number itself is still wrong!

The real question is why the scriptwriter thought "twenty years old" was such a damning indictment in the first place. The Enterprise is the equivalent of a naval ship, not a car...

 

[Dukhat]

The real question is why the scriptwriter thought "twenty years old" was such a damning indictment in the first place. The Enterprise is the equivalent of a naval ship, not a car...

Well, look at it this way: Are you using the same computer that you were using twenty years ago? Starfleet vessels are heavily computerized. Perhaps it got to the point where it was easier to retire 20 year old ships instead of upgrading their systems.

Don't get me wrong; I'm not defending Morrow's statement. It sounds utterly ridiculous to me too. But perhaps at that point in Starfleet's history, retiring ships early was their modus operandi. Heck, they phased an entire class of ship (the Soyuz) out of service in a relatively short period of time, despite other ships of their lineage continuing in service into the late 24th century.

 

[UssGlenn]

My justification is that Starfleet calculates age of ships based on the percentage of new parts it has. If a 40 year old ship is refit and 50% is replaced then as far as Starfleet is concerned it's 20 years old. you can tweak the percentages to whatever you need to to make the Enterprise's age work with the dialog.

 

[B.J.]

My justification is that Starfleet calculates age of ships based on the percentage of new parts it has. If a 40 year old ship is refit and 50% is replaced then as far as Starfleet is concerned it's 20 years old. you can tweak the percentages to whatever you need to to make the Enterprise's age work with the dialog.

And then we get into the whole Ship of Theseus / Lincoln's axe discussion.

 

[C.E. Evans]

The real question is why the scriptwriter thought "twenty years old" was such a damning indictment in the first place.

Because for the majority of people who were watching the movie, Trek had been around 15 years or so at the time, and weren't too concerned if the Enterprise's age was casually rounded up to 20 years, give or take a few.

The Enterprise is the equivalent of a naval ship, not a car...

It's possible that 20 years was considered old for a starship at the time though. Later starship designs probably could last longer...

 

[STEPhon IT]

It's possible that 20 years was considered old for a starship at the time though.

Only for closed minded writers who never served in the military, and for one who never followed the series. The Enterprise was around 40 years old, still a ship in it's prime, the ship is a body, it's what Star Fleet installs in it which makes it relevant. Naval vessels go through upgrades all the time, there was no reason to decommission a ship at her age. 80 years old in service? Or more? Then yes, it should be decommissioned.
The genesis of those decisions were plans for Harve Bennett to make Star Trek his own by dumping the Enterprise and bringing forth that ugly looking Excelsior. I heard DC comics had the rights to illustrate Trek books and had Kirk steal the Excelsior and a had missions until the release of Nimoy's The Voyage Home where he superseded Harve's wishes and rightfully went with the real Enterprise.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Only for closed minded writers who never served in the military, and for one who never followed the series.

Actually, a case could easily be made by those very same writers that starships aren't like oceangoing ships and are subject to substantially far more wear and tear on a daily basis from the natural hazards of space as well as from years of impulse and extended warp flight.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Well, look at it this way: Are you using the same computer that you were using twenty years ago?

Yes. Windows 95 is awesome!

OK, OK, just kidding!

Starfleet vessels are heavily computerized. Perhaps it got to the point where it was easier to retire 20 year old ships instead of upgrading their systems.

Well, we know the "20 years" thing is wrong anyway. The thought of retiring a ship after *40* years (Enterprise's actual age at the time, in universe) doesn't seem that egregiously bad, especially since Enterprise had just suffered extensive battle damage. My comment was more around why the writer of the "20 years" line thought that sounded old for a ship.

Actually, a case could easily be made by those very same writers that starships aren't like oceangoing ships and are subject to substantially far more wear and tear on a daily basis from the natural hazards of space as well as from years of impulse and extended warp flight.

Since we don't actually know the stresses involved, I guess I could actually see warp travel as a valid excuse as to why a starship might have a lower average service life than an ocean-going naval ship. But as I said above, I don't really have a problem with the thought of Starfleet retiring a 40 year old ship, since that doesn't sound terribly out of line with a navy equivalent.

Just for fun*, I pulled together a list of warships currently in service in the Canadian navy, to see how old they were, based on commissioning date. I can do this in a reasonable amount of time, since our navy is small . All data from Wikipedia.

Iroquois Class Destroyer
HMCS Athabaskan is the only ship in this class still in service. 43.6 years.

Halifax Class Frigate
12 ships -- average age 21.6 years

Victoria Class Submarine
* age is based on their original commissioning date in the Royal Navy, rather than their commissioning date in the Canadian Navy
4 submarines -- average age 24.3 years

Kingston Class Coastal Defence Ships
12 ships -- average age 18.2 years

I guess a more telling statistic would be to go through and figure out the average age of all the ships that have been decommissioned over the years. But that's a bigger job, and I don't feel like it right now!

Of course, we don't have any starships IRL... but we had the orbiters. They don't really have commissioning dates, so for them I calculated their ages from the day they were delivered at Kennedy Space Center, to the day they returned from their final flight. Which is probably completely arbitrary, but whatever. So their ages at retirement were:

Discovery - 27.4 years
Atlantis - 26.3 years
Endeavour - 20.1 years

Average - 24.6 years

* Yes, I know I have an odd definition of "fun".

 

[Albertese]

And at least for the NASA orbiters, they were tinkered with throughout their lives. There were pretty extensive renovations done for the return to flight operations after both Challenger and Columbia disasters. So it's not as though they spent a quarter century of being the same vehicle. (Ship of Theseus and all that)

--Alex

 

[Timo]

I guess a more telling statistic would be to go through and figure out the average age of all the ships that have been decommissioned over the years.

One interesting aspect of that would be to note that many smaller ships built during WWII would have very short service lives, having deliberately been built not to last. Only desperately poor navies would retain those in service after the end of the war (and in such cases, they might end up serving for half a century or more).

Would NCC-1701 be a wartime build? Or perhaps a stopgap vessel that ended up serving well past her expiration date because the successor was never built?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[B.J.]

One interesting aspect of that would be to note that many smaller ships built during WWII would have very short service lives, having deliberately been built not to last. Only desperately poor navies would retain those in service after the end of the war (and in such cases, they might end up serving for half a century or more).

Would NCC-1701 be a wartime build? Or perhaps a stopgap vessel that ended up serving well past her expiration date because the successor was never built?

I doubt it. She was an explorer after all, not any sort of "Liberty ship".

 

[Forbin]

Now do the US Air Force:
(This is from the 2015 USAF Almanac)

B-52 - 76 in service - average age 52.4 years
B-1 - 63 in service - average age 27.0 years
A-10 - 297 in service - average age 32.5 years
F-15C - 213 in service - average age 29.6 years
F-16C - 814 in service - average age 23.8 years
KC-135 tankers - average age 54.2 years
C-5 cargo planes - average age 42.5 years
C-130E cargo planes - average age 51.0 years
AC-130 gunship - average age 44.5 years

And military airplanes take a lot of punishment in normal use, and need a LOT of maintenance to keep in shape.

 

[STEPhon IT]

Actually, a case could easily be made by those very same writers that starships aren't like oceangoing ships and are subject to substantially far more wear and tear on a daily basis from the natural hazards of space as well as from years of impulse and extended warp flight.

But it's the reason these ships continue to go to starbases and outposts to get repairs and upgrades, no different when car owners get a tune up or maintenance check. A good reason to decommissioned the ship is if there's something inside the ship which is lethal for passengers and it must be done, but to do it because it's 20 years old in the future... seemed like a strategic avenue of passing the torch.

 

[C.E. Evans]

But it's the reason these ships continue to go to starbases and outposts to get repairs and upgrades, no different when car owners get a tune up or maintenance check.

All that does it keeps the vehicle from being retired early, especially if there's no immediate replacement for it (or something even better waiting in the wings).

 

[STEPhon IT]

All that does it keeps the vehicle from being retired early, especially if there's no immediate replacement for it (or something even better waiting in the wings).

And that's what Harve Bennett was going with Excelsior; something even better waiting in the wings. And it was the ugliest ship I've ever seen... similar to Enterprise E and the NX-01 which appeared more like a successor to E.

 

[Timo]

I doubt it. She was an explorer after all, not any sort of "Liberty ship".

ITRW, explorers do tend to be "Liberty ships", or tended to be until very recently. Cousteau's little Calypso is an archetype for those throwaway ex-warships! (But now we have this... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octopus_(yacht))

Timo Saloniemi

P.S. how does one give a name to a link nowadays, instead of pasting the entire URL? The "insert link" button doesn't offer the option of editing the name, it just stubbornly says "LINK" on the top line.