Could the OG Enterprise have been recovered and rebuilt at all after ST III?

[The Rock]

Even though they used the self-destruct, after the self-destruct went off it didn't completely vaporize the ship.

As you can see in the image above, the stardrive section was still completely intact and only half of the saucer section was gone.

In season 3 of Star Trek: Picard, Geordi was the head of a space Starfleet museum and he managed to take the saucer section of the Enterprise-D that crash landed on Veridian III after ST: Generations and then over the period of many years he revived the Enterprise-D by using a stardrive section from another Galaxy-class ship. He did such a thorough job of reviving her that she flew again to fight the Borg one last time and was victorious!

So do you think Geordi ever considered taking the wreckage of the OG Enterprise to rebuild it for the Starfleet museum? I know that he had the Enterprise-A in the Starfleet museum (which is cool and all but as we all know it isn't the OG Enterprise). I mean, a lot of it is still intact so I think it could be a project worth pursuing for him. I'm not saying he would have to go so far as to make her battle (or even flight) worthy, but rebuild her just enough to be presentable as part of his Starfleet museum. Hell, maybe he could just rebuild the exterior and just simply not bother with the inside.

EDIT: NM. I forgot the planet the Enterprise crashed on (the Genesis planet) also blew up lol. OK, so as @Morpheus 02 suggested, let's shift the conversation to ... what if the Enterprise did NOT fall into the atmosphere....could it have been recovered partially!

 

[Morpheus 02]

Or maybe shift the conversation to ... what if the Enterprise did NOT fall into the atmosphere....could it have been recovered partially?

The disc was destroyed (certainly the vital computer components), but maybe the rest? I assume the "self destruct" was mainly for the ship's computer, and could happen despite widespread ship damage

 

[Mage]

So, as OP stated, the ship was definitely destroyed when Genesis went BOOM. But it most likely was vaporized in the atmosphere.

HOWEVER..... Had non of that happened, it seems most likely enough of the superstructure was left to rebuild it. The problem is, the Enterprise was already quite damaged from its battle during TWOK and Starfleet was going to retire it. We also don't know how damaged the internal systems were after the self destruct.
A vanity project that took decades led by a great engineer as a hobby? Sure, people take cars that should be scrapped and rebuild them all the time. It just might take ages.
But I doubt Starfleet would invest time and resources into it, when building a new and more modern ship was more effective.

The biggest thing that always felt off by TSFS's self destruct was, well, the ship wasn't really destroyed. It was really fucked up, but not destroyed.

 

[Humanoid #77]

I think I read (in a fan work) the ship fell so fast and in a shallow angle it bounced on a lake and returned to orbit, then when the planed exploded it went away to deep space.

I also think in the movie Apollo 13 they talked about a risk of bouncing the upper atmosphere during reentry (because speed/trajectory) and go back up.

So the answer is maybe it was found by someone and restored somewhat and is now a pirateship

 

[David cgc]

I wonder what the in-universe reason was for it blowing up like that was. I can get the idea of internal explosives (planted or improvise) destroying anything valuable or secret, the computers, the control systems, the weapons, the engines, and there were probably more internal explosives that, say, melted the warp coils and shattered the intermix chamber (and the structural frame was probably twisted and weakened throughout, making it a ship-shaped pile of metal that was likely to crumple the first time it was hit), but why blast open just the front half of the saucer? What makes that section need to be so much more thoroughly destroyed than the rest of the ship?

 

[Morpheus 02]

I wonder what the in-universe reason was for it blowing up like that was. I can get the idea of internal explosives (planted or improvise) destroying anything valuable or secret, the computers, the control systems, the weapons, the engines, and there were probably more internal explosives that, say, melted the warp coils and shattered the intermix chamber (and the structural frame was probably twisted and weakened throughout, making it a ship-shaped pile of metal that was likely to crumple the first time it was hit), but why blast open just the front half of the saucer? What makes that section need to be so much more thoroughly destroyed than the rest of the ship?

I would guess the main computer, for one. Definitely want that completely destroyed, plus some phaser banks. Warp engines might not be needed because they assume whoever is attacking the ship has that particular technology.

Also, is the engine room around there? Is the antimatter amd dilithium crystals in that area?

 

[Ray Hardgrit]

I wonder what the in-universe reason was for it blowing up like that was.

Joke answer: the self destruct is the one system on the ship that doesn't get tested in action so maybe it was just faulty.

Sensible answer: Scotty revealed in the last movie that properly blowing up the Enterprise would destroy V'Ger too, so it would certainly take out a tiny Bird of Prey. Maybe they deliberately avoided detonating the warp core to ensure that their only hope of escaping the exploding planet remained intact.

 

[DonIago]

Also, if they blew up the warp core that close to the Genesis Planet, then the planet could very likely explode ahead of schedule.

"Mister Scott's Guide to the Enterprise" (apologies if I've misremembered the name) theorized that the E had two different destruct modes. A more violent one that would annihilate the ship by the simple expedient of dropping the antimatter containment fields, and a more restrained one as evidenced that used explosive charges but would prevent a matter-antimatter explosion.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Even if the Enterprise had engaged self-destruct in deep-space, I think the spaceframe and other key systems would have been so badly wrecked that Starfleet would have went "f**k it, let's just build another one."

IMO, the restortation/recreation of the Enterprise-D was a special case and only because Geordi LaForge was behind it and had enough sway with Starfleet to make it happen. Otherwise, the wreckage of that ship would probably still be sitting in a starship grave yard--like Surplus Depot Z15--to be used for spare parts for other ships.

 

[DonIago]

^That certainly seems likely. I would think one point of a self-destruct is to render the ship worthless to hostile forces, which would include making sure there's not enough left for a hostile force to be able to rebuild it enough to later impersonate a Starfleet vessel.

I think another factor with the E-D was the fact that the saucer did survive largely intact.

 

[C.E. Evans]

It's not canon, but the TNG Technical Manual probably was the first to come up with the idea that the Enterprise-D's saucer could make an emergency "slide landing" on a planetary surface back in 1991. The only real difference between how it played out in Generations was that the Manual suggested that it would ideally still be able to maneuver at impulse and have a much more controlled descent.

It also implied that the saucer would never fly again due to structural damage from the slide and also possibly partially collapsing under its own weight in a gravity environment (no more structural integrity field?). Of course this was later contradicted in PIC, but I think there was the thought that the saucer was indeed toast after being recovered from Veridian III, prompting Starfleet to pass the Enterprise name to a new Sovereign-class ship rather than rebuild the Enterprise-D.

"Captain's log, stardate 48650.1. Three Starfleet vessels have arrived in orbit and have begun to beam up the Enterprise survivors. Our casualties are light but unfortunately the Enterprise herself cannot be salvaged."
--From the logs of Captain Jean-Luc Picard

Well, we kind of now know better.

 

[Humanoid #77]

This is something from a book, about the self-destruct :

As a final line of defense, to prevent capture, Enterprise was designed to incorporate two separate self-destruct systems. The proposed first of these, to be used only in deep space and clear of all planetary bodies, involved the total shutdown of all magnetic insulation systems in the linear intermix chamber and in all antimatter storage bottles. The planned result was an uncontrolled detonation and chain reaction, engulfing any ship or other body near the sun-like fireball. The ship's computer would be programmed to execute this procedure if the last two words in the destruct command were "destruct one."


The secondary self-destruct plan, to be used in planetary orbit or when too near any other object to be preserved, resulted in the detonation of specially placed charges throughout the ship. All antimatter bottles were to be ejected intact, and than escape along a course chosen during the last minute by the ship's computer. All breakers would be overridden, and all onboard electrical and computer systems would overload and detonate. Finally, powerful charges within the hull were to destroy the superstructure and render the ship a lifeless hulk, useless to enemy captors. The ship's computer would be programmed to execute this procedure if the last two words in the destruct command were "destruct zero."

 

[DonIago]

This is something from a book, about the self-destruct :

I'm pretty sure that's an excerpt from Mister Scott's Guide to the Enterprise, which I referenced upthread.

 

[DonIago]

It's not canon, but the TNG Technical Manual probably was the first to come up with the idea that the Enterprise-D's saucer could make an emergency "slide landing" on a planetary surface back in 1991. The only real difference between how it played out in Generations was that the Manual suggested that it would ideally still be able to maneuver at impulse and have a much more controlled descent.

It also implied that the saucer would never fly again due to structural damage from the slide and also possibly partially collapsing under its own weight in a gravity environment (no more structural integrity field?). Of course this was later contradicted in PIC, but I think there was the thought that the saucer was indeed toast after being recovered from Veridian III, prompting Starfleet to pass the Enterprise name to a new Sovereign-class ship rather than rebuild the Enterprise-D.

"Captain's log, stardate 48650.1. Three Starfleet vessels have arrived in orbit and have begun to beam up the Enterprise survivors. Our casualties are light but unfortunately the Enterprise herself cannot be salvaged."
--From the logs of Captain Jean-Luc Picard

Well, we kind of now know better.

The tech manual may have simply not anticipated someone being driven and/or bored enough to spend years on the salvage effort.

 

[publiusr]

I think I read (in a fan work) the ship fell so fast and in a shallow angle it bounced on a lake and returned to orbit, then when the planed exploded it went away to deep space.

Real space author James Oberg talked about how early R-7 flights had observers fooled a bit:

Sputnik witnesses saw failure, then success

Few people actually saw Sputnik and its rocket take off — and when they did, they feared at first that the launch was a failure. The world's first-ever orbital liftoff provided a new perspective on flight.

www.nbcnews.com

Here, it looked like R-7 was going down—but wasn’t.

I wonder what the in-universe reason was for it blowing up like that was.

Damage from Reliant…safeing/removal for return, etc.

Here is a possible scenario.

Right after Khan slumps to the floor, perhaps one remaining augment gathers him up into a Killer Bee or some other craft.

Khan (like Spock) is rejuvenated by the wave—and observe Enterprise skipping back out as the Genesis planet’s field fluctuates.

There is just enough functional equipment left for another stasis field with Shuttle components scavanged—something they started on Reliant as an escape pod.

So you could have an away team find Enterprise, with a little surprise tucked away…

 

[The Rock]

It's not canon, but the TNG Technical Manual probably was the first to come up with the idea that the Enterprise-D's saucer could make an emergency "slide landing" on a planetary surface back in 1991. The only real difference between how it played out in Generations was that the Manual suggested that it would ideally still be able to maneuver at impulse and have a much more controlled descent.

It also implied that the saucer would never fly again due to structural damage from the slide and also possibly partially collapsing under its own weight in a gravity environment (no more structural integrity field?). Of course this was later contradicted in PIC, but I think there was the thought that the saucer was indeed toast after being recovered from Veridian III, prompting Starfleet to pass the Enterprise name to a new Sovereign-class ship rather than rebuild the Enterprise-D.

"Captain's log, stardate 48650.1. Three Starfleet vessels have arrived in orbit and have begun to beam up the Enterprise survivors. Our casualties are light but unfortunately the Enterprise herself cannot be salvaged."
--From the logs of Captain Jean-Luc Picard

Well, we kind of now know better.

Wanna know something funny? When I first saw Star Trek: Generations back when it came out in theaters, I honestly thought that Nebula-class ship the USS Farragut (one of the three ships who beamed up all of the Enterprise-D survivors) at the very end was actually carrying the crashed saucer section of the Enterprise-D lol.

 

[Humanoid #77]

I'm pretty sure that's an excerpt from Mister Scott's Guide to the Enterprise, which I referenced upthread.

That's correct

The tech manual may have simply not anticipated someone being driven and/or bored enough to spend years on the salvage effort.

Who could? Geordi is bananas

Real space author James Oberg talked about how early R-7 flights had observers fooled a bit:

Sputnik witnesses saw failure, then success

Few people actually saw Sputnik and its rocket take off — and when they did, they feared at first that the launch was a failure. The world's first-ever orbital liftoff provided a new perspective on flight.

www.nbcnews.com

Here, it looked like R-7 was going down—but wasn’t.

very cool

omething funny? When I first saw Star Trek: Generations back when it came out in theaters, I honestly thought that Nebula-class ship the USS Farragut (one of the three ships who beamed up all of the Enterprise-D survivors) at the very end was actually carrying the crashed saucer section of the Enterprise-D lol.

Lol great idea, I neve thought of that. The Refit D could make in the next movies

 

[Tallguy]

No.

This is a Rose and Jack and The Door situation. Could Jack have been saved by Rose? No. That was the whole freaking point. But what if she - No. But maybe he could have - No. But we didn't know about - NO!

The Enterprise was meant to blow up in the most cinematic and thrilling way possible. But however they showed it one screen it was meant to blow up and be gone. Whatever variables you want to change after the fact the final answer to the question is: No, because she blew up.

Now could they collect all the pieces that were removed in the "refit" (almost totally new Enterprise) and put Humpty Dumpty back together again?

 

[FredH]

Joke answer: the self destruct is the one system on the ship that doesn't get tested in action so maybe it was just faulty.

Sensible answer: Scotty revealed in the last movie that properly blowing up the Enterprise would destroy V'Ger too, so it would certainly take out a tiny Bird of Prey. Maybe they deliberately avoided detonating the warp core to ensure that their only hope of escaping the exploding planet remained intact.

That actually makes quite a bit of sense, given how close the two ships are in the film. (In the novelization they’re presumably a lot farther away from each other, and the Enterprise does go up like a star, instead of the piecemeal blowup.)

 

[DonIago]

Assuming the E hadn't burned up over Genesis, I'd say that if any significant parts of it were salvageable then that would indicate that the self-destruct system failed to work properly.