- 10/07/2025
A starship with an illustrious heritage that was gone before her time.
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00:00One of the great things that I get to do as a host here on Trek Culture is I get to go
00:04super super into detail about all of these ships that in my head I'm just flying around.
00:12That's why lists like this written by our own Clive Burrell is so much fun. With that in mind
00:18I'm Sean Ferrick for Trek Culture and here are 10 secrets of the USS Enterprise F you need to know.
00:26Number 10 Verity on High. The arrival of the Enterprise F in Star Trek Picard wasn't actually
00:33the first time in canon that we saw an Odyssey class vessel. IDW's graphic novel prequel series to Picard
00:41featured the USS Verity NCC 97007. This was assigned to Admiral Picard to assist in the Romulan evacuation
00:52program the precursor to the supernova that would kickstart not only the Kelvin universe but also
00:58a lot of the action in Picard and beyond. As noted in an article for IDW itself Star Trek Online's
01:05Thomas Maroney the person who adapted the design to fit Star Trek Online stated that in this period
01:12of history there were two Odyssey class ships created. One was the USS Verity the other was
01:18the USS Odyssey. They were created as a direct response to the Riemann Scimitar. You all remember
01:25how big that was and this was Starfleet's version of a heavy cruiser. The further we look into this
01:32the backstory states that actually the Odyssey class was put on hold so that all of the resources for
01:38designing and building the fleet of ships could be put into the Verity to rush that into service for
01:44the Romulan evacuation. However with the subsequent failure of the Romulan evacuation and the destruction
01:51of Utopia Planitia shipyards the Odyssey itself was somewhat forgotten and the Verity was mothballed.
01:58We have a couple then of different backstories to the Odyssey class depending on whether you follow
02:02Star Trek Online or whether you follow IDW's story but it does remain that the Enterprise F is the only
02:10Odyssey class ship that has received any significant screen time in the episodes of Picard. Number nine
02:17thanks for the support. Taking inspiration from the Enterprise F's online heritage the one that we saw
02:23in the show did in fact feature a small docked support craft at the aft. In the spot that historically
02:31would see the shuttle bay on such ships like the Constitution class we get the Aquarius class support ship.
02:38This is analogous to the aero shuttle on Voyager and the Calypso captain's yacht of the Enterprise D
02:45and like those we never really got to see it do anything in the few minutes of screen time that
02:52the Enterprise F got. In Star Trek Online the ship was actually destroyed in 2410 by Captain Sean
02:59but naturally it was redesigned, rebuilt and redocked. The ship wasn't just a support craft in terms of
03:08getting people off the ship if needs be. It was different from a runabout in that way. It could
03:13actually enter a battle on the support side of the Enterprise F as well. Both the Aquarius and the
03:19Odyssey class actually got their names from the Apollo 13 space mission. They were named after the lander
03:27and the command module. Of course that would go on to make sure that we would all remember the phrase
03:33Houston we've had a problem. Number eight. Now for the stats. The best resource for information on the
03:39Enterprise F is Star Trek Online and the official breakdown that's given for the ship there. Built at
03:45the Utopia Planitia shipyard the Enterprise F was armed with 18 Mark 12 phaser arrays, four variable
03:51payload warhead launchers, two phaser turrets and two heavy phaser cannon mounts. A bit of beefed up firepower
03:59for the Enterprise F then. One thing that the design carried over from both the Galaxy and Sovereign
04:03class ships was that it had the ability to separate its saucer section. This was a little bit different
04:09where the Enterprise D's saucer section was used effectively as a life raft to help people escape
04:16a battle scenario. The saucer section of the Enterprise F was designed to become a separate fully
04:22operational battleship if the situation required it. It was in a way then closer in design to the
04:30experimental Prometheus class. There was of course an array of shuttles. There was also an Argo which
04:36you will remember from Star Trek Nemesis and there was several Yellowstone class runabouts. Now the
04:42Yellowstone was slightly different from the Danube class and was only seen once before in Star Trek
04:47Voyager's non-secretaire. There is also a captain's yacht and of course the previously mentioned
04:54Aquarius. Number seven. Feeling shunned? It only took 33 years if you don't include the silent appearance
05:04in Star Trek Lower Decks but Elizabeth Shelby returned to Star Trek. She had gone from the promotion
05:10hungry Borg expert from Best of Both Worlds to become a full admiral who was ceremonially
05:17at least in charge of the Enterprise F during the Frontier Day celebrations. The Picard logs that
05:23were released online suggested that the ship has had a variety of captains over its lifespan
05:27but in Star Trek Online the Enterprise F is commanded by the Andorian Captain Vakel Shon. This makes him
05:36the third non-human commander of an Enterprise after Spock in the Wrath of Khan and Worf if that little
05:44wink and nod is what we think it is in the episode Vox. There are of course other variations. In Peter
05:51David's novel Imzadi from 1992 it suggests the Enterprise F is in service around 2408 and is
05:59commanded by none other than Data. The later DS9 series Millennium would also suggest that there was
06:05an Enterprise F but this ship was a Defiant class that was built after the destruction of the Enterprise E.
06:11it was initially commanded by Jean-Luc Picard later commanded by William Riker until it too bit the
06:18bullet. Number six. Competitive Edge. The Enterprise F design actually came about from a competition run
06:24by Star Trek Online to celebrate its first anniversary. Aptly named Design the Next Enterprise. This wasn't the
06:32first time that a competition like this had been run. The Pocket Books had actually run a similar
06:37competition with the Luna class USS Titan coming from that designed by artist Sean Tarango. The success
06:44of the Luna class competition contributed to convincing CBS that this Design the New Enterprise idea was a good
06:51one and so they ran with it and they got thousands of entries which were then narrowed down to about 25
06:59before eventually being narrowed down to a final four. The criteria for the design was relatively
07:04straightforward. Effectively when you looked at it you had to think iconic Federation starship. So
07:12two nacelles, deflector dish, primary hull, saucer section. With all of these aspects being included in his
07:19design Adam Eel actually won the overall competition. Some of the other close to the close to the first place
07:28entries included Jason Vector Lee's four nacelled ship that would actually be repurposed and reused as
07:36the USS Chimera in Star Trek Online commanded by Captain Nog. Number five screen time. The Enterprise F
07:45just misses out on the honor of having the shortest amount of screen time of any of the Enterprises.
07:53That honor goes to the Enterprise J which we only really saw a design graphic of and a bit of the
08:00corridor that Daniels and Archer were standing in in Enterprise's third season. The Enterprise F
08:06appears in the last two episodes of season three of Picard, Vox and The Last Generation. Now it was
08:13shown quite heavily in the trailers and the marketing campaign but it was also
08:18very quickly stated that it wasn't going to be the hero ship of the season so as to kind of tease
08:26audiences but also not set them up for well not seeing very much of it. The F was seen earlier
08:33in the season as a graphic on the file that Roe Lahren gives to Picard but apart from these few fleeting
08:43glimpses we don't really get to see very much of it. Also the return of the Enterprise D in the very
08:51last scene of Vox and of course The Last Generation does somewhat eclipse the Enterprise F just just a
08:57bit and considering that the Enterprise F was to be decommissioned after Frontier Day it's unlikely that
09:05we're going to see her again for a while. Number four, size of it now. The Enterprise F reflected the
09:12way Enterprises had been going you know when you think the Enterprise B was bigger than the Enterprise
09:18A, C to the B, D and then E is longer than D but D is technically a bigger ship. But yes it reflected
09:27the time of Starfleet's need for these larger vessels be they for exploration or with the advanced
09:34dangers of the Dominion and the Borg and I suppose the Romulans that Starfleet needed more battleships.
09:41The Enterprise G on the other hand reflected this new more peaceful era of Starfleet's history so
09:49it was deemed to shrink the size of the flagship and it would then become the this neo-constitution
09:57class which we had of course seen in the season as the Titan A. Things must have got a little hairy
10:03again as the years went on because the Enterprise J is roughly the size of Earth's moon. All right that's
10:10a bit of an overstatement but it is considerably larger. The Enterprise F is 1061 meters long as
10:17opposed to the Enterprise E which was 685 meters. The Enterprise D was only 641 meters long but as I
10:25stated it was rather larger in other respects. This makes the Odyssey class the largest class of ship
10:32that have been seen in the prime timeline up to that point. It does have fewer decks than the Enterprise D,
10:3932 as opposed to 48. This however is in part due to its lengthier more streamlined shape. This makes
10:46the Enterprise F around two and a half times the size of the original Constitution class which itself
10:52only had 23 decks to fit 430 crew. As they state in Trials and Tribulations they really did pack them in
11:00on these old ships just for fun. If we hop over into the Kelvin timeline the USS Vengeance would still dwarf
11:06the Enterprise F. It is 1450 meters long. As a big ship. Number three, crafty construction. One of the
11:17defining features of the Enterprise F is the double neck that it boasts as opposed to the singular neck
11:24of almost all previous ships. According to the bonus issue of the Enterprise F from Eagle Moss's Star Trek
11:32Starships collection Adam Eel's design was favored because it was big and majestic. There were design
11:38cues from the Galaxy and Sovereign classes that made it feel familiar and the double neck was the icing on
11:43the cake. Eel himself had revisited the work of original Enterprise designer Matt Jeffries as well as
11:50the futuristic ideas of Doug Drexler for the Enterprise J and of course Andrew Probert's design of the Enterprise D.
11:58He kept the overall shape quite similar to what had gone before. The primary hull was raised and separate
12:04from the secondary hull via this double neck. The nacelles were attached with backward facing pylons.
12:12Quite simply put, it looked like an Enterprise. Cryptic's Thomas Moroney then made a couple of slight alterations
12:19when designing the ship for Star Trek Online. He widened the neck for example and he swept back the saucer a little bit
12:26over the engineering hull. To date, this is the only ship in canon that has this kind of distinct design.
12:33Number two, short shelf life. According to Star Trek Picard, the NCC-1701F was only in service for
12:40about 15 years. It was being decommissioned in 2401's Frontier Day following a disastrous Monfet gambit that saw
12:50a catastrophic systems failure ship-wide. It was deemed easier to decommission the ship than to repair it.
12:58Now, if that sounds like a bit of a short life for a ship, consider that the Enterprises A, B, C, D and E all
13:07came in under that 15-year lifeline. In fact, D had the shortest lifespan at only seven years, whereas the
13:16original Enterprise, if we include the refit as well, was going around for about 40 years. That
13:23record is not likely to be broken anytime soon. The Picard logs that preceded Star Trek Picard revealed
13:30that the ship had been commissioned in 2386. Executive producer and showrunner Terry Metallus
13:35stated that Admiral Shelby's posting of the Enterprise F was purely for the ceremonies of Frontier Day only.
13:43There was a series of unnamed in the show captains who had command during the Enterprise's lifespan.
13:50In Star Trek Online, however, the Enterprise F was only commissioned in 2409, which meant that the
13:57Enterprise E probably had a longer lifespan, although its final fate may still have not been Worf's fault.
14:06Number one, no to the upgrade. The Enterprise F's appearance in Star Trek Picard cements itself in
14:13prime canon that we have seen it. It has been out there and it got, well, seven layers of hell
14:20kicked out of it by the Borg, but we won't think about that for the moment. What it does is that
14:26with the decommissioning of the Enterprise F on screen, it means that what happened in Star Trek Online is
14:35very unlikely to happen. Well, it can't because the Enterprise G has already been commissioned.
14:40In Star Trek Online, the Enterprise F received a major overhaul and refit following the closing of
14:47the Iconian War. These refits included more prominent impulse engines, changes to the nacelles and the pylons,
14:54and a change of the overall paint scheme, and that's just on the outside. These were seen for the first time
15:00in the episode Cilia and Charybidus. Now, Eagle Moss's Star Trek Starships collection did in fact
15:07release a model of this refit Yorktown class. Eagle Moss released two variants of the original Enterprise
15:15F, one in the largely black and white livery that's seen in Star Trek Online, and one in a more
15:22traditional Starfleet Grey. The producers of Star Trek Picard decided to go with the online version,
15:28which means, fondly enough, that grey model of the Enterprise F can really only be found
15:35as an option within Star Trek Online. And there you have it. There is the secrets of the Enterprise
15:39F that you need to know. What did you think? Let us know in the comments below. Thanks so much
15:43again to Clive Burrell for penning this list, and thank you so much to Martin for making this video
15:49look pretty. You're all awesome and wonderful folks, please remember to follow us over on Twitter,
15:53follow us on Instagram, follow us on Blue Sky as well. We are at TrekCulture, we're at TrekCultureYT,
16:00excuse me, on Instagram. Otherwise, we're just at TrekCulture on Twitter, at TrekCulture on Blue Sky,
16:04and depending on when this video releases, we may or may not have a TikTok channel.
16:08Who knows? I have been Sean. You can follow me at SeanFerrick on the various socials.
16:13You are wonderful. You are awesome. Look after yourself until I'm talking to you again. Make sure that
16:18you live long and prosper. And in this crazy, crazy world that we're living in, remember,
16:25there are good people left. You might be one of them. Thanks very much. Heavy phaser cannon mounts.
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