The Most Important Starships in Star Trek Besides Enterprise

Star Trek's most famous space vessel is the Starship Enterprise. First under the command of Captain Pike, then Captain Kirk and later in the next generation, it fell under the command of Captain Picard. Starships named Enterprise are favored ships indeed.

However, even the greatest ship or able crew can't do it all alone. Among the history of Star Trek television series and feature films, there are many other starships. Warp speed vessels, which distinguished themselves in valiant battle or thrilling exploration. Here are other Starfleet starships and those who piloted them.

USS Intrepid NCC-1831

This was also a Constitution class vessel like its sister ship the USS Enterprise. In the original series episode, The Immunity Syndrome, an enormous single celled organism, like some mammoth amoeba destroys the Intrepid.

What's most disturbing about the story and the ship's destruction is that Spock senses the all Vulcan crew of about 400 dying as the ship is destroyed. Spock's shocking revelation gave us an idea of how powerful his race was in terms of mental connection. The scene remains one of the most chilling and powerfully dramatic moments in the entire Star Trek mythology.

USS Reliant NCC-1864

Under the command of Captain Terrell in the hit movie Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, the USS Reliant was primarily a science vessel of exploration and discovery.

Dr. Carol Marcus, former flame of Captain Kirk was head of the Genesis Project, which needs a planet devoid of life to initiate experimentation. An away team composed of Terrell and first office Chekov discover far too late that they've landed on the wrong planet. Instead of Ceti Alpha VI, they are on Ceti Alpha V, a planet which many years earlier Captain Kirk under order of Starfleet Command had stranded Khan Noonian Soong, the villainous genetic superman of a past war torn Earth. The superior minded Khan manages to take control of Reliant and engage his old enemy Kirk in battle and the space battles which ensue are still considered by many as some of the best in Star Trek.

USS Excelsior NX-2000

Known as the "great experiment", this vessel had a breakthrough in starship warp speed technology called transwarp.

First showcased in the movie Star Trek III: The Search For Spock, then later in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country under the command of Captain Sulu, the Excelsior was a sleekly designed and powerful starship. One of the more comedic moments in Star Trek III, concerned Scotty sabotaging the ship's engines by removing essential hardware. When the Excelsior tries to chase after Kirk who "borrows" the Enterprise from space dock, the Excelsior sputters weakly to a stop as the Enterprise jumps away into warp.

USS Defiant NX-74205

The Defiant was a little ship with a lot of power. Starfleet being a non-military organization of explorers at its core, finally made something more resembling a battleship for high level defense in response to a rampaging alien threat.

Making its debut in third season of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, this starship was developed as a powerful defense against the Borg threat looming over the Federation. Station DS9 Commander Benjamin Sisko participated in Defiant's design, which was fitting since he lost his wife Jennifer in the infamous Borg battle of Wolf 359. Sisko never did take the Defiant into battle against the Borg, but the Klingon Worf did to great fanfare in the movie Star Trek: First Contact.

USS Voyager NCC-74656

Captain Janeway was the first female captain featured on a Star Trek series and her vessel was another first by being a strikingly different class of Starship and not of the Enterprise lineage.

Voyager boasted a sleeker design than other Starships, a reduced crew size and internal circuitry enhanced by bio-neural gel packs, a kind of living computer based on an organic brain. On a mission to stop a terrorist group called the Maquis, Voyager followed the band into a strange sector of space known as the Badlands. Subsequently they were tossed 70,000 light years into the Delta Quadrant by an enigmatic super alien called the Caretaker.