New page on main site

[ReinnResauq]

Perhaps the page should be along the lines of an evaluation of Starfleet regs. Why could you just make up a few names of other design specialists, such as Jerold Welling, lead electrician? No reason not to add a little to the realism of Star Trek and point out that "Hey, ships are designed by several people, despite what you may say about the Death Star being designed by one person."

[Ender]

No reason not to add a little to the realism of Star Trek and point out that "Hey, ships are designed by several people, despite what you may say about the Death Star being designed by one person."

It has never been said it was designed by a single person.

Lemmisk was the lead engineer for it's construction, not the sole designer.
Siener only came up with the concept for it, he didn't design it.
Tol Siveron lead a team of scientists including Qwi Xux who worked with Bevel and his engineers to come up with the "necessary advances" that allow the Superlaser to work
And an unknown amount of Geonosians designed most of the thing based on Sienars concept.

Where is it said a single person designed the Death Star? The only superweaon with a sole designer was the Darksaber, and A) That wasn't a total design from the ground up, it was an extreme modification of an existing design and B) That was shown to be a failure.

[Vympel]

Does the TM include a list of designers? If so, hang them out to dry.

[Darth Wong]

All right, all finished. A little short for a "realistic" deposition - six and a half pages - but I think it's amusing. Should I E-mail it, or post it, or what?

Might as well post it. Maybe people will have suggestions, more items to add, etc.

[Darth Wong]

That wouldn't have been her responsibility on the design project. Even a "star" engineer is just one member of a team of literally thousands.

True, although all major design decisions would ultimately be the responsibility of the project manager (who should be a licensed engineer), and I was under the impression that she was that person.

If, say, a sub-system was found to be improperly designed, the engineer who worked on that piece would be in trouble. But if the entire concept was fucked up, then the project manager sucks it down.

Moreover, if the project manager puts his name on any of the designs, then he is responsible for them, even if others actually designed them. No engineer may stamp his name onto a blueprint without having thoroughly inspected it first. It is, in fact, illegal to do so.

[Enlightenment]

True, although all major design decisions would ultimately be the responsibility of the project manager (who should be a licensed engineer), and I was under the impression that she was that person.

No.

According to the E-D bridge plaque as reproduced the TNGTM, the E-D technical design was the brainchild of

Andrew Probert
Herman Zimmerman
Richard James
John M. Dwyer
Jim Mees
Cari L. Thomas
Richard McKenzie

Robert Legato
Daniel Curry
Gary Hutzel
Ronald B. Moore
Wendy Neuss
Richard Arnold

Dr. Rick Sternbach
Dr. Michael Okuda

Gregory Jein
Dana White

Brams doesn't even rate mention.

(any resemblence between the names of the E-D design team and the names of Trek producers and VFX types is purely coincidental. )

[Darth Wong]

I dunno if practical jokes count as canon, particularly when they're not clearly visible onscreen.

[CmdrWilkens]

I dunno if practical jokes count as canon, particularly when they're not clearly visible onscreen.

Well if B&B were on the plate it'd eb fun to label them as the project managers and try them. Actually you COULD do that with Voyager as I believe their names are on that plate.

[Patrick Degan]

That wouldn't have been her responsibility on the design project. Even a "star" engineer is just one member of a team of literally thousands.

True, although all major design decisions would ultimately be the responsibility of the project manager (who should be a licensed engineer), and I was under the impression that she was that person.

If, say, a sub-system was found to be improperly designed, the engineer who worked on that piece would be in trouble. But if the entire concept was fucked up, then the project manager sucks it down.

Moreover, if the project manager puts his name on any of the designs, then he is responsible for them, even if others actually designed them. No engineer may stamp his name onto a blueprint without having thoroughly inspected it first. It is, in fact, illegal to do so.

Your points are quite valid.

A recheck of "Booby Trap" is definitely in order to determine what Leah Brahms' actual role in the design and building of the Galaxy-class starship. I do know that at the very least, she was the head of the warp drive design team at Utopia Planetia and designer of the reactor itself, according to the episode. I'll have to watch the tape again.

According to the roll-call on the Enterprise's commissioning plaque displayed on the main bridge, the Engineering Group was headed by Capt. Andrew Probert. The Warp Technologies Development Group was headed by Capt. Robert Legato. The Advanced Technologies Group was headed by Dr. Rick Sternbach, and the chief yard engineer was Capt. Greg Jein. A picture of the plaque can be seen on pg. 76 of The Art Of Star Trek.

However, Leah Brahms should certainly be held fully liable for all the fuckups she was responsible for.

[ReinnResauq]

ReinnResauq wrote:
No reason not to add a little to the realism of Star Trek and point out that "Hey, ships are designed by several people, despite what you may say about the Death Star being designed by one person."
It has never been said it was designed by a single person.

I've heard enough Trekkies saying so. I personally never cared other than finding it worrysome that people like that find such a thing plausible. In any case, this would hammer the point home.

[SPOOFE]

All right, here it is, based on the assumption that Brahms was a significant figure in the design of the GCS. Keep in mind that this was a quick-write intended only for gag humor rather than realistic parody witticism. All the other names were made up by me and, as far as I know, were never characters in the show.

Enjoy.

---------------------------------------------------------

The minutes of the newly-formed Starfleet Engineering Council, stardate 48332.4, overseeing review of Leah Brahms, primary designer of the main portions of the Galaxy-class starship. Councilmen Gadden Peak, Creech Tyone, and Surrerven Xorch presiding.

PEAK: “This meeting is now in session. The review of Leah Brahms competence is in question, and this council will determine if her license should be revoked, and if punishment is to be rendered.”

TYONE: “The charges: Failing to install manual overrides on crucial ship controls, over-reliance on the ship’s main computer for the most basic safety measures, failing to install redundancies for crucial ship systems, over-centralization over control of shipboard functions, installing crucial ship systems aboard an unnecessary, disposable section of said ship, failure to recommend corrective action even after serious problems were identified…”

XORCH: “Please, councilman Tyone, if we read all the charges we will be here all night.”

TYONE: “I am merely following the protocol of these meetings.”

XORCH: “Shall we say that there are… extenuating circumstances in this case?”

TYONE: “Very well. Bring in the accused!”

Leah Brahms walks into the room, in chains. She is seated in the deposition stand.

PEAK: “Please state your name for the record.”

BRAHMS: “I’m Batman.”

PEAK: “Let it be noted in the record that the accused is clearly lacking in mental competence for this hearing. Let us commence.”

BRAHMS: “No, really. I’m Batman.”

PEAK: “That’s nice, dear. Now—“

BRAHMS: “Are you not impressed by my Batliness? Quick, to the Batcave!”

PEAK: “Bailiff, if the accused has one more outburst, you are permitted to flog her.”

BAILIFF: “Sure t’ing, boss.”

PEAK: “Now, let us commence. Does the accused have anything to say in her defense?”

BRAHMS: “Yeah. I blame Bugs Bunny. That’s where I got the idea for the Galaxy-class. And besides, don’t they look pretty?”

PEAK: “All right. Councilman Tyone, you may begin the questioning of the accused.”

TYONE: “Let us start at the top. Miss Brahms, during one operation, the Galaxy-class starship U.S.S. Enteprise, registry NCC-1701-D, suffered loss of control over her engines when the isolinear chips were removed by the assistant chief engineer. There were no overrides or backups present to prevent such a simple crippling of the vessel. How can you justify this design decision on your part?”

BRAHMS: “The isolinear chips weren’t supposed to be pulled. If they weren’t, my design would have been perfect.”

TYONE: “Yes, but didn’t you notice the fact that such a design allowed the ship to be so easily crippled, by one man?”

BRAHMS: “It wasn’t supposed to be crippled.”

TYONE: “The possibility existed, madam. Your design made it incredibly simple for a single saboteur to threaten the lives of all the people onboard any Galaxy-class starship, anywhere, at any time.”

BRAHMS: “But they weren’t supposed to do it.”

TYONE: “Madam, we’re not talking about what people are ‘supposed’ to do. We are talking about what they would reasonably and realistically do. Your design left any Galaxy-class ship vulnerable to a single malicious saboteur, a blatant oversight on your part.”

BRAHMS: “It’s not an oversight! I can’t control everybody in the universe. How was I supposed to know that someone would want to remove the isolinear chips?!?”

TYONE: “Calm down, please. You’re an engineer. Your job is to make sure that your designs are safe. By allowing such a weak spot in the system that can be so easily exploited, you created an inherently unsafe vessel.”

BRAHMS: “My design was perfectly safe, as long as the isolinear chips were left in place.”

TYONE: “Yes, but the possibility—“

BRAHMS: “Anything’s possible! Why, a quantum flux distortion of the dipole continuum matrix could’ve caused the entire ship to transform into a banana!”

PEAK: “Please, councilman, let us abandon this point of contention. It is clear that the accused has no defense for her design decision. And madam, please refrain from using the word ‘quantum’ in our presence.”

TYONE: “Very well. No further questions to the accused on this point.”

PEAK: “Councilman Xorch, your turn to speak.”

XORCH: “Very well. Miss Brahms—“

BRAHMS: “Batman.”

XORCH: “— in the dossier you were presented, it told of the destruction of the U.S.S. Yamato. Are you familiar with that event?”

BRAHMS: “Yes sir.”

XORCH: “Then you are aware that the U.S.S. Yamato was destroyed by a simple computer virus, correct?”

BRAHMS: “Ah, but wait, it wasn’t a simple computer virus. It was an Iconian computer virus!”

XORCH: “A correct, yet irrelevent, quibble. The point of contention: Were you not aware that the safety systems of the Galaxy-class of starships were utterly and completely reliant – centralized, if you will – on the main computer of said ship?”

BRAHMS: “Of course I was. That’s why I designed it. It was very elegant that way.”

XORCH: “Then you understand that, by completely centralizing the safety systems and providing no hard backups anywhere, over a thousand people lost their lives?”

BRAHMS: “They weren’t supposed to lose their lives.”

XORCH: “Madam, please, cease your insistence on what was ‘supposed’ to happen, and focus on what did happen. Did it not occur to you, during the design process, that total reliance on the computer system was a fragility in the ship design?”

BRAHMS: “No.”

XORCH: “Why not, pray tell?”

BRAHMS: “Because they weren’t suppos— er, that is, uh…”

XORCH: “You never considered the possibility?”

BRAHMS: “That’s it!”

XORCH: “Even though it was so simple and obvious that even the ten-year-old viewers of the show managed to catch it?”

BRAHMS: “Viewers? Show?”

XORCH: “Nevermind. Do you not see how running all safety features through the central computer results is an unsound design?”

BRAHMS: “No…”

XORCH: “Madam, it results in a weakness due to the fact that a single action can cause a crippling—“

PEAK: “Councilman Xorch, we appreciate your efforts to educate the accused, but this is neither the time nor the place for a basic engineering lesson.”

XORCH: “Agreed, Councilman Peak. No further queries.”

PEAK: “Next point of contention: On stardate 42923.7, the U.S.S. Enterprise underwent a battle simulation against the U.S.S. Hathaway. Are you familiar with the instance in question?”

BRAHMS: “Yes.”

PEAK: “Now, while you were primarily responsible for the propulsion system of the Galaxy-class, you had a significant hand in the design of numerous other systems, including weapons and transporters. Correct?

BRAHMS: “Oh, yes. I can multitask.”

PEAK: “I’m proud of you. Now, during the exercise, a Ferengi vessel interrupted the two vessels. The attack left the Enterprise with ‘fused’ phaser connections and disabled transporters. The crew was not able to use either system. How do you explain that a massive vessel, the strongest in Starfleet at the time, was disabled by just a few lucky shots?”

BRAHMS: “It wasn’t supposed to be shot at.”

PEAK: “Miss Brahms, ignoring your previous insistences about what was ‘supposed’ to happen, I assure you that the Galaxy-class vessels – indeed, all Starfleet vessels for the past century – have been designed to survive at least mild combat. Yet your contributions to the Galaxy-class design couldn’t even accomplish this.”

BRAHMS: “Sure it will. The Enterprise survived that encounter, didn’t it?”

PEAK: “Through luck and the ingenuity of its crew, yes.”

BRAHMS: “See? There you go! I designed the Galaxy-class to be chock full of luck.”

PEAK: “Madam, according to the regulations manual, ‘luck’ is not a defineable engineering system.”

BRAHMS: “But it worked!”

PEAK: “Your conclusion, madam, is that the only reason the U.S.S. Enterprise was not destroyed was through sheer luck?”

BRAHMS: “Yes, of course.”

PEAK: “Very well. A note for the log: The accused has yet to provide a single justification for her design decisions.”

TYONE: “Another note for the log: The accused is now picking her nose and ingesting the contents.”

BRAHMS: “Mmmm…. Nose-candy….”

TYONE: “Moving on… the dossier you were provided with described an incident in which the U.S.S. Enterprise – odd how that one ship seems to come up so much – suffered an infection from a parasite. This parasite damaged the attitude and control systems, and thus prevented the ship from being able to drop out of warp. How do you explain that such damage resulted in loss of control, rather than a hard shutdown of the offended system for repair and safety?”

BRAHMS: “Don’t be ridiculous. The ship wasn’t supposed—“

TYONE: “Madam, one more utterance of the word ‘supposed’ and we will find you in contempt.”

BRAHMS: “Oh, ah… it was unforeseen circumstances.”

TYONE: “The possibility that control might possibly be damaged at one point was ‘unforeseen’ to you?”

BRAHMS: “Yes.”

TYONE: “Are you unfamiliar with the old engineering axiom, Whatever can go wrong will go wrong?”

BRAHMS: “Um… of course! Shakespeare said that, didn’t he?”

TYONE: “Uh… no.”

BRAHMS: “Leonardo da Vinci?”

TYONE: “No!”

BRAHMS: “Beethoven?”

TYONE: “No! It’s Murphy’s Law! Edward Murphy said it, back in the year 1949!”

BRAHMS: “1949? Sir, at the Academy, we never cover any subject later than the 1700s.”

TYONE: “Now this is utterly reprehensible.”

PEAK: “Agreed.”

XORCH: “Councilmen, I would like to perform a mindmeld on the accused, to see if there is anything worthwhile to her, or if we should write her off as a total loss.”

PEAK: “Very well.”

TYONE: “No argument from me.”

BRAHMS: “Now wait a minute…”

PEAK: “Bailiff, if the accused resists, you are authorized to stun her.”

BAILIFF: “Duh, aw’right, boss… I gotta itchy trigger finger anyways.”

XORCH: “Your mind to my mind… our minds are one… our minds… are one… my mind to your mind… you will let me see your thoughts… my mind…”

PEAK: “Xorch, what’s taking so long?”

XORCH: “Your mind… to… my mind…”

PEAK: “Xorch?”

XORCH: “Councilman Peak… I’m not detecting any mind within Miss Brahms.”

PEAK: “No mind?”

XORCH: “Just… just the image of dancing monkeys and lollipops.”

PEAK: “What are you saying, Xorch?”

XORCH: “Leah Brahms is not sentient.”

PEAK: “Very well. With these new findings – along with the accused’s inability to defend her design decisions – I propose, under the newly appointed Engineering Council’s mandate, that the accused, Leah Brahms, be taken to a holding facility to await euthanization. Any disagreement?”

TYONE: “None from me.”

XORCH: “Nor me. While I typically disapprove of capital punishment, in this case, it would be a mercy killing.”

PEAK: “Very well. Bailiff, take her away.”

BAILIFF: “All right, c’mon girlie.”

PEAK: “This concludes the first session of the Starfleet Engineering Council.”

End Log.

[Patrick Degan]

...but I think Mike's intent is to do something along the lines of an actual commission inquiry, treated in a serious vein, as his means of ripping Trek writer notions of engineering (which are comical) rather than a satire piece. The product he might produce out of this project, I believe, would be more like the Starfleet tactical analysis of the Empire on the main site.

[NecronLord]

im gonna contribute to this one, my perticular beef is the Warp Core Ejection System as you could see. It's a badly designed piece of shit. Othwrs include the jeffries tubes, the badly designed computer software, and the lack of fire suppression like the HALON system and or sprinklers.

Actually they do have fire suppression. It uses a forcefeild to enclose the fire so it runs out of air. Reliant on the main computer of course.

Also add to the charges how easily the android Data was able to take complete control of the Enterprise in Brothers

[Vympel]

This should really become a general trial against everything that's negligent with the Galaxy-class design.

[seanrobertson]

Does anybody want to contribute toward a new page on the main site?

I want to do a mock Starfleet Engineering Council disciplinary hearing of Leah Brahms, designer of the Enterprise-D. The premise is that during the Dominion War, the council head was sacked for incompetence, and the new council chair intends to clean house, restore order, and bring sanity back into Federation engineering. Now that the war is over, they're disciplining unlicensed practitioners and/or revoking licenses {EDIT: and possibly even initiating serious legal action with the possibility of imprisonment for reckless public endangerment and the irresponsible recommendation that GCS's were safe for civilian transport} for those who have demonstrated incompetence.

Anyway, I'm interested to know if anybody has any feedback on this idea (or even potential contributions toward the page, which would be credited of course).

Interesting idea. I can't help because my degree is in literature.
I was eager to meet beauties like Rebecca (The only real
drawback I can see to an engineering degree is that you might
not have a lot of chicks in your classes. No big deal I guess.)

Off-topic, but in the vein of court martials and disciplinary action,
I'd probably have gone after Picard with gusto after the second
Borg attack. He helped fend it off, but had he allowed that
silly paradox program to've been uploaded into Hugh, there
might not have been any invasion whatsoever.

That's hardly original, I know...but compared to the mere
brow-beating Nechayev gave Picard about that, I think I would've
taken far more serious action against him. Personally, I
like the character. But unlike him, I wouldn't let sentiment
stand in the way of hundreds to thousands of lives lost.

I also like Worf, but that peckerhead has done so many wreckless
things I don't know WHERE to begin. How many members of
the Klingon HC has he killed anyway?

Alas, as I said, that's off-topic. I hate to see Leah burn because
I always thought she was cute (if a bit heavy as the Brahms
character...she was much thinner and even younger-looking
as Lt. Cmdr. Benteen in DS9). But it should make for a really
neat page

[Ted C]

It occurs to me, that in all fairness, we might want to also include a court martial for dereliction of duty following the loss of the Executor at Endor. Apparently no one was manning the auxiliary bridge during a combat situation.

[Patrick Degan]

It occurs to me, that in all fairness, we might want to also include a court martial for dereliction of duty following the loss of the Executor at Endor. Apparently no one was manning the auxiliary bridge during a combat situation.

Sure, if you want to conduct a court-martial of ashes, I suppose...

[seanrobertson]

It occurs to me, that in all fairness, we might want to also include a court martial for dereliction of duty following the loss of the Executor at Endor. Apparently no one was manning the auxiliary bridge during a combat situation.

Sure, if you want to conduct a court-martial of ashes, I suppose...

(Taking cup of ashes, identifying a few as Piett's...)

"You have failed me for the last time, Admiral Piett..."(ashes poof)

At least, that seems to be an Imperial-style court martial.
Brutal, but effective

Apropos Ted's idea, how about court-martialing Piett for letting
the Millenium Falcon escape at the end of TESB? Or hanging
poor Bevel by the testicles for his exhaust port weakness on
DS-1?

I think the Emperor already did something akin to the latter, or
worse...could be wrong, though.

[LMSx]

Or hanging
poor Bevel by the testicles for his exhaust port weakness on
DS-1

I think the Emperor cloned him, allowed the original body to experience death, brought the consciousness of the original to the clone, and repeated the process, killing him 17 different times.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Where'd you get the 17 figure from?

[Illuminatus Primus]

And yeah, the Emperor killed Lemilisk for the Death Star I blunder by sealing him in a cage and allowing him to be consumed alive by a culture of Yavin IV Pirana Beetles he procured from somewhere when he learned Yavin IV would be obliterated by the DS I. He felt I'd be ironic to have Lemilisk be eaten alive by a species that his weapon should've been rendered extinct (except for off-planet cultures). Palpatine then used the art of Life Transfer he'd already executed on his own consciousness (Palpatine first assumed a clone body shortly before A New Hope, according to an issue of Gamer) and returned Lemilisk to life in a fresh clone body. Palpatine did this several more times with Lemilisk, once throwing him out of an airlock, once very slowly lowering him into a pool of molten copper (and Lemilisk would one day wonder why Palpatine chose copper, and Palpatine mundanely replied that it was what was being smelted that day in that area of the plant), and once by throwing him in a chamber full of corrosive acid mist, so his lungs would be eaten from within. I also read back and discovered it was seven, not seventeen times, that Lemilisk was executed and subsequently resurrected by Palpatine. Off topic, but as an interesting note, Palpatine did not summon the engineer to the Deep Core to await his counteroffensive against the New Republic after the Battle of Endor. He was eventually executed by the New Republic, whom he requested "At least be sure you do it right this time."

[SPOOFE]

...but I think Mike's intent is to do something along the lines of an actual commission inquiry, treated in a serious vein, as his means of ripping Trek writer notions of engineering (which are comical) rather than a satire piece.

I agree. But as I've already mentioned, I'm not very familiar with such a board of inquiry. Instead, I just had some fun.

[Slartibartfast]

Mike: I don't know if this has been suggested before, but wouldn't it be great if we (i.e. you) created a 're-enactment' of the GCS project stuff like it was done in the Bradley movie? Even cast Kelsey Grammer as the project managers

Only in this case, the truth wasn't discovered until too late

[Ender]

It occurs to me, that in all fairness, we might want to also include a court martial for dereliction of duty following the loss of the Executor at Endor. Apparently no one was manning the auxiliary bridge during a combat situation.

We can't really determine that, we know from Iron fist and Wraith Squadron that transfering control after the bridge was destroyed takes time. By the time they did, the machinets mates in propulsion had already doomed the ship. Not their fault, they didn't know the DS was dead ahead, they just followed SOP, but still.

[Ender]

Where'd you get the 17 figure from?

It is stated in the book.