USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-B)
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In the Star Trek fictional universe, the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-B) was a modified Excelsior class starship, commissioned in 2293 and initially captained by John Harriman. The Enterprise-B was the third Starfleet vessel to carry the name. The only time this ship was seen was in the movie Star Trek: Generations.
Maiden voyage
The first mission of the Enterprise was to take a number of reporters, Captain James T. Kirk, Commander Pavel Chekov, and Commander Montgomery Scott on a ride around the solar system. It was during this demonstration that the Enterprise received a distress call from the ship Lakul. The Lakul was transporting El-Aurian refugees after a disaster destroyed their homeworld—later revealed to have been the Borg invasion of that world. The ship was not fully equipped—it did not have a tractor beam, photon torpedoes, or even a full crew as the medical section was not yet on board. But the Enterprise was the only ship in the vicinity of the Lakul; Harriman ordered the Enterprise to the scene at maximum warp. When the Enterprise arrived, they found the Lakul and another transport trapped in an energy rift. Harriman tried to free the ships by a variety of means without taking the Enterprise into the rift. These efforts failed, and one of the ships was destroyed by the phenomenon. On Kirk's advice, Harriman took the ship into the rift. When the Enterprise got within transporter range, Mr. Scott was able to rescue 47 out of the 150 people aboard the Lakul before its destruction. However the Enterprise was then trapped in the rift, and her hull integrity was failing fast. Scott believed an emission from the navigational deflector could free the ship from the rift. The reconfiguration of the device involved manual adjustments, which Kirk performed in time. The Enterprise was able to free itself from the rift, but an energy discharge from the rift struck the ship near the deflector dish. The energy discharge sheared off several sections in the stardrive hull, include that in which Kirk was working; he was presumed dead. The Enterprise-B then returned to Earth.
Later missions
The Enterprise-B was only seen in the movie Generations. It can be assumed that the ship was repaired when she returned to Earth and then began regular duty. Further details on her, such as specific missions, crew, and her decommission date are not known.
The Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual has indicated that this Enterprise was involved in a long-term exploration of unexplored portions of the Goumari area of the galaxy and made first contact with a number of civilizations during her explorations.
Authors have begun to fill in the gaps that exist in Star Trek history with a series of books, The Lost Years; these include further missions of the Enterprise-B. While not canon, one of these books suggests that the Enterprise was in some way involved in the Tomed Incident of 2311: the last official contact between the Romulans and Federation until 2364.