SS Tsiolkovsky
From Memory Alpha, the free Star Trek reference.
| SS Tsiolkovsky | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Class: | Oberth-class |
| Registry: | NCC-53911 |
| Affiliation: | Federation/Starfleet |
| Status: | Destroyed (2364) |
The SS Tsiolkovsky (NCC-53911) (Cyrillic: К. Э. Циолковский) was an Oberth-class Federation science vessel, built at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, USSR and commissioned in 2363, on stardate 40291.7.
In 2364 the Tsiolkovsky was assigned to observe the collapse of a red giant star. During that mission the crew fell victim to a form of polywater intoxication. After losing contact, Starfleet ordered the USS Enterprise-D to investigate the fate of the vessel and its 80 crew members. The Tsiolkovsky was discovered adrift in space, its bridge open to space due to an open emergency hatch, with all hands lost. When the Enterprise crew became infected with the same virus, and was in danger from a stellar core fragment, they bounced a repulser beam off the Tsiolkovsky, which pushed the Enterprise away from the fragment, providing the necessary time needed to restore power to the engines and warp away. While the Enterprise survived, the Tsiolkovsky was destroyed. (TNG: "The Naked Now")
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[edit] Background
The SS Tsiolkovsky was named after the 20th century Russian space scientist, Konstantin E. Tsiolkovsky. The dedication plaque listed the name "K.E. Tsiolkovsky", (albeit with some characters misrendered), whereas Captain Picard identified it as the SS Tsiolkovsky. This fits modern naval practice of occasionally referring to a ship named after a person by just the surname.
This is one of only a handful of Starfleet ships not established to have the prefix "USS" before the name, as "SS" is used instead. While no explanation was tendered in the episode, the plaque identified Tsiolkovsy as a Starfleet registered vessel (with an NCC number), and there was a Starfleet crewmember's corpse aboard. Its possible calling it "SS" instead of "USS" mirrors a current US Navy convention of "de-commissioning" a ship on loan to another (non-Navy) agency, with an identical change of name prefix to "SS", "USNS" or none at all.
| Oberth-class starships |
|---|
| USS Biko • USS Copernicus • USS Grissom • USS Oberth • USS Pegasus • SS Tsiolkovsky • SS Vico • USS Yosemite • Unnamed |
