Why did they carry passengers

[psheldrake1]

Just a bit confused with this. Why did the Enterprise ( Picard ) carry passengers. They are out in deap space, most of the time battling others. When all this time the have people, not crew, on board. Makes no sense to me.

[MindTrick]

Well, the Galaxy class star ship was built for deep space exploration. They have families on board so officers would not have to leave them home, where they would possibly not see them for months. The Galaxy class, although built to take a beating and give one back, was not a "Battle Ship". Also, the Saucer section, where the living quarters are, could spererate leaving the warp section as a battle ship if need be.

 

Remember, Star Fleets main goal is explore, not to engage in war.

[GhostShadow]

thats right, the civis are there to keep the officers feeling like they are at home.

 

[Steveo]

If you watch DS9 3x01 (The Search, Part 1), which is when the Defiant first appears, Kira says that Starfleet and The Federation don't believe in warships.

 

A deep space mission could last years, so the galaxy class ship made sense.

[Wazer]

I think about half the ship was taken up by civilians ie spouses and children.

They all had things to do on ship as well (though I'm not sure what).

This also makes sense because who would want to join starfleet if your not paid and have to leave family behind probably only career officers making non-coms like crewman, pettey officers etc which make up the bulk of the crew hard to recruit.

The Galaxy class also has plenty of space available to pick up people in an evacuation situation or colonisation.

[wahaha]

Starfleet isn't a military organization. Just think of the Enterprise as 50% cruise ship, and 50% science, exploration, and school.

 

It's more like the U.N. They just keep the peace in a military rank fashion, and use force only when necessary, but prefer not to.

[Tenebrae]

Really, the benefits of having civilians etc. on board are surely outweighed by the fact that the Enterprise was running up against the Romulans/Borg/Cardassians/random spacial anomalies regularly.

 

While I think Picard remarks that people fight that bit harder knowing their family on board, it always seemed pretty irresponsible to me. Not to mention the obvious compromise made to ship design to accomodate what amounts to dead weight. It does of course reflect the nature of Starfleet though... really it's nothing short of a miracle they haven't been invaded and conquered though. I guess that wouldn't make for a good happy ending.

 

It always seems that people just join starfleet because there isn't much else to do though.

[theaveng]

Well' date=' the Galaxy class star ship was built for deep space exploration. They have families on board so officers would not have to leave them home...[/quote']

 

Too bad the ship never really explored. Most of the episodes were about internal squabbles, or visiting already known planets. Piard's enterprise did less exploration that Kirk's enterprise!

 

.

 

As for battles, Picard once remarked that they had become "complacent", and that's why pure battleships (no families) like the Defiant were built.

 

troy