In Federation Ships, what does the USS stand for?

Gil Hamilton · Post by **Gil Hamilton** » 2004-02-04 02:30pm

Like the title says, what does the USS stand for when used with Federation ships? I'm curious.

Tribun · Post by **Tribun** » 2004-02-04 02:31pm

United Stars Ship

That is all.

Gil Hamilton · Post by **Gil Hamilton** » 2004-02-04 02:34pm

Tribun wrote:United Stars Ship

That is all.

Huh. It's like they took United States Ship and went, hrm, States isn't right, and thumbrubbed Stars in there.

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2004-02-04 02:43pm

United Star Systems is another possibility.

HRogge · Post by **HRogge** » 2004-02-04 02:48pm

United federation of planets Star Ship ?

Gil Hamilton · Post by **Gil Hamilton** » 2004-02-04 03:11pm

HRogge wrote:United federation of planets Star Ship ?

That would make the most since, but you'd think that Federation and Planets are big enough nouns to be included in the acronym.

Incidently, Ex Astris Scientia seems to be of the opinion that it's United Stars Ship.

Crazedwraith · Post by **Crazedwraith** » 2004-02-04 03:15pm

United Star Ship. All though i beleive kirk said on occossion Unied Space Ship

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2004-02-04 03:16pm

The characters have said "United Star Ship" in TOS, so I imagine that's what it stands for.

Could it be that United is short for UFP but Starfleet just didn't like the sound of "UFPSS Enterprise"? I certainly don't.

Ma Deuce · Post by **Ma Deuce** » 2004-02-04 03:31pm

My question is: What does the "NCC" in the registry number stand for?

General Zod · Post by **General Zod** » 2004-02-04 03:36pm

new constitution class, iirc. with the letters used to signify the class of starship involved. similar to the alpha-numeric designation on fighter craft used by the airforce.

Gil Hamilton · Post by **Gil Hamilton** » 2004-02-04 03:42pm

Uraniun235 wrote:The characters have said "United Star Ship" in TOS, so I imagine that's what it stands for.

Could it be that United is short for UFP but Starfleet just didn't like the sound of "UFPSS Enterprise"? I certainly don't.

If they've said it in TOS, then that's good enough for me.

Tribun · Post by **Tribun** » 2004-02-04 03:44pm

So it is all clear now?

Gil Hamilton · Post by **Gil Hamilton** » 2004-02-04 03:45pm

Ma Deuce wrote:My question is: What does the "NCC" in the registry number stand for?

I understand it stands for Naval Construction Contract.

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2004-02-04 03:54pm

Kirk said in the TOS episode "Court Martial" that him and Ben Finney had both served aboard the "United Space Ship Republic". I think that pretty much clears it up.

Crazedwraith · Post by **Crazedwraith** » 2004-02-04 04:14pm

Gil Hamilton wrote:
Ma Deuce wrote:My question is: What does the "NCC" in the registry number stand for?
I understand it stands for Naval Construction Contract.

It doesn't stand for anything. The prefix was invented by Matt Jefferies. He put in the "N" for aircraft regesitered in The USA the C for civilian aircraft and the second "C" because it looked good.

paladin · Post by **paladin** » 2004-02-04 04:44pm

Crazedwraith wrote:
Gil Hamilton wrote:
Ma Deuce wrote:My question is: What does the "NCC" in the registry number stand for?
I understand it stands for Naval Construction Contract.
It doesn't stand for anything. The prefix was invented by Matt Jefferies. He put in the "N" for aircraft regesitered in The USA the C for civilian aircraft and the second "C" because it looked good.

I remember reading somewhere that NCC was created by Gene Roddenberry. It was suppose to combine the Soviet and American hull classification letters for a general purpose cruiser.

Jason von Evil · Post by **Jason von Evil** » 2004-02-04 06:35pm

This is from EAS:

NCC: Starfleet, active service
NX: Starfleet, experimental

Metrion Cascade · Post by **Metrion Cascade** » 2004-02-04 08:09pm

There is no canon explanation. But Naval Construction Contract makes sense. And while I have heard in-canon the phrase "United Star Ship," I also considered the possibility that Starfleet ships are named after historical ships from Earth, so if it was named after an American ship it gets USS, if it was British it gets HMS, if it was Canadian it gets HMCS, what have you. And just for the hell of it, I'll mention that we heard Martok call his ship "IKS Rotarran."

Repeated Google searches for "naval construction contract," including searches that ruled out any page containing "star trek" or "starfleet," still did not yield a single non-Trek reference. If it's used in building real ships, or the aircraft carrier Enterprise is NCC 1701 (which I heard when I was in the Navy), there is absolutely nothing I can find online about it.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2004-02-04 08:39pm

Metrion Cascade wrote:There is no canon explanation. But Naval Construction Contract makes sense. And while I have heard in-canon the phrase "United Star Ship," I also considered the possibility that Starfleet ships are named after historical ships from Earth, so if it was named after an American ship it gets USS, if it was British it gets HMS, if it was Canadian it gets HMCS, what have you.

Too bad there's been a USS Yamato, USS Melbourne, etc etc etc.

Patrick Degan · Post by **Patrick Degan** » 2004-02-04 11:07pm

In TOS, USS came to be identified with "United Space Ship". Diane Duane, in her novels, interpreted it as "United Systems Starship".

NCC has been interpreted in various non-canon sources as "Naval Construction Contract" and "Navigational Contact Code".

RedImperator · Post by **RedImperator** » 2004-02-04 11:15pm

Metrion Cascade wrote:Repeated Google searches for "naval construction contract," including searches that ruled out any page containing "star trek" or "starfleet," still did not yield a single non-Trek reference. If it's used in building real ships, or the aircraft carrier Enterprise is NCC 1701 (which I heard when I was in the Navy), there is absolutely nothing I can find online about it.

The first carrier Enterprise was CV 6. The second is CVN 65. I assume the NCC numbers are equivilant to naval hull numbers. NCC 1701 was made up by Matt Jefferies because his private plane's registry number was NC 171 or something similar.

Metrion Cascade · Post by **Metrion Cascade** » 2004-02-05 12:00am

Howedar wrote:
Metrion Cascade wrote:There is no canon explanation. But Naval Construction Contract makes sense. And while I have heard in-canon the phrase "United Star Ship," I also considered the possibility that Starfleet ships are named after historical ships from Earth, so if it was named after an American ship it gets USS, if it was British it gets HMS, if it was Canadian it gets HMCS, what have you.
Too bad there's been a USS Yamato, USS Melbourne, etc etc etc.

Presumably they could be named after ships that haven't been commissioned yet, but it's moot. Starfleet never used anything other than USS, and we've heard United Space Ship and United Star Ship.

Sarevok · Post by **Sarevok** » 2004-02-05 01:37am

I initialy thought that USS means United States Ship. To me the Enterprise-D was operated by the Americans of 24th century.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2004-02-05 01:41am

Well, considering how Trek has favoured American culture over that of other nations, it practically was.

Drooling Iguana · Post by **Drooling Iguana** » 2004-02-05 10:07pm

Unbelievably Stupid Spacefarers?