StarDestroyer.Net BBS

I'm sure that this has been asked and answered before, but I've always wondered: How does a transporter operater know who to pick up when he recieves the orders "Two to Beam up" or something like it? I mean, when the request is to beam up only a portion of an away team, or to beam up a person who wasnt even on the away team, or wasnt even known to be there in the first place (case in point Riker's transporter Clone) how does the operator determine who to transport?

the almighty plot device. Maybe they have electronic thumbs.... who knows?

The communicators also act as location transponders for transport operations. Also, since accurate scanning would be a requirement for any transport, we can presume reasonably that their sensors can pick out two close-proximity targets, one of whom is sending a signal to the ship.

Patrick Degan wrote:The communicators also act as location transponders for transport operations. Also, since accurate scanning would be a requirement for any transport, we can presume reasonably that their sensors can pick out two close-proximity targets, one of whom is sending a signal to the ship.

What if there are more than the requested number in close proximity? Does the operator just guess? "Oops, sorry, grabbed the wrong guy down there."

They sometimes seem to try and get into a specific formation or posture when they're getting ready to beam out. In Best of Both Worlds, Worf specifically stands up at attention when he gets ready for beam-out, so that may be one way they communicate who is to be beamed out.

If there's a lot of people around, then the transporter operator would probably beam up the Starfleet personnel... and if there's a lot of Starfleet personnel around, those who are beaming up probably either separate themselves or stand a certain way so as to distinguish themselves from the crowd.

There are probably protocols designed to avoid having to verbally describe who they want to beam up every time they want to beam out.

Pure Sabacc wrote:

Patrick Degan wrote:The communicators also act as location transponders for transport operations. Also, since accurate scanning would be a requirement for any transport, we can presume reasonably that their sensors can pick out two close-proximity targets, one of whom is sending a signal to the ship.

What if there are more than the requested number in close proximity? Does the operator just guess? "Oops, sorry, grabbed the wrong guy down there."

Usually the person sending up the command is standing next to the person who's going to beam up with him. Just as in "Yesterday's Enterprise" when Dr. Crusher had herself and the wounded Capt. Garrett beamed over to the E-D.

The transporter must have some way of scannng the transport location, such as to orient the landing party/away team's desination relative to the ship's transporter pad. The transporter chief( Scotty?) told Kirk and the other guy to crouch down when they beamed over to the First Federation ship Fesarius, due to the low ceiling.

The Transporter Chief must be able to "see" which personell are standing and waiting to be beamed up, while the non-beamers are off doing whatever.

We always see the folks who are going the be beamed up standing or kneeling and not moving, while everyone else is just wandering about or doing something. The transporter chief probably picks the stationary people, as I'd imagine moving while being dematerialized would be bad for you. Of course, we also see folks beamed up in mid-motion, so that theory might be whack.

Its most likely a combination of Transporter protocol on the part of people being transporter and the transporter chief paying attention to whats going on.