USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-B)

The USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-B), sometimes referred to as the Enterprise-B or NCC-1701-Beta, was a Federation explorer in service to Starfleet in the late 23rd and early 24th centuries. She was launched in 2293 under the command of Captain John Harriman. She was later commanded by William George, Demora Sulu and Thomas Johnson Jr..

Over the course of the Enterprise-B's service, she was remembered as a key figure in exploring beyond the Gourami Sector, mapping over 142 star systems and making first contact with 17 different civilizations. The Enterprise served as flagship of the Federation. The Enterprise-B was also the first Federation starship Enterprise in 30 years that did not have Captain James T. Kirk in command of the vessel. 

Construction
The Enterprise was built at the Antares Ship Yards; the decision to model the ship after the failed experiment USS Excelsior (NCC-2000) was highly controversial. However, Starfleet decided to use it for both economic and technical reasons, as Excelsior classes had shown that they could withstand the test of time; indeed, they would still be in service nearly a century after first being developed. 

Maiden voyage
By 2293 construction work on the Enterprise had been completed, with only a few components needing to be installed such as a tractor beam and the loading of photon torpedoes. Despite this, the Enterprise-B was launched from a drydock orbiting Earth on a maiden voyage with three honored guests aboard in the form of Captains James T. Kirk and Montgomery Scott and Commander Pavel Chekov, as well as a large number of journalists.

Although the maiden voyage was just meant to be a short trip out to Pluto and back again, the Enterprise received a distress call from two Federation transport ships who were bringing El-Aurian refugees back to Earth. Although not fully equipped, there were no other vessels in range, and Captain Harriman reluctantly gave the order to intercept them. Upon arrival, the Enterprise discovered that the transports had become trapped in an energy distortion called the Nexus, and the starship herself became ensnared in the distortion when moving into transporter range. Unfortunately, the Enterprise was too late to help the crew of one transport, the SS, as it exploded and was only able to rescue 47 people at of 150 aboard the SS, before it too was destroyed.

Trapped in the Nexus, Captain Scott devised a way to free the ship using a resonance burst from the deflector dish to simulate an antimatter explosion, after a plan to use torpedoes was discarded, as there weren't any on board. Captain Kirk went to deflector control in order to make the necessary modifications as the Enterprise's secondary hull was struck by an energy tendril. The Enterprise escaped with minor casualties and a major hull breach along sections 20 through 28 on decks 13 through 15. Kirk was believed killed in the breach, and the mission became notorious due to his loss. 

An inquiry that followed cleared Harriman of any blame, although several former members of Kirk's crew held him to account. At some point by approximately 2294, Harriman would have a dedication plaque for Kirk installed in the area of the ship where he was at the time believed to be killed. 

After obtaining a Klingon bird-of-prey, the Montgomery Scott of the future traveled back in time from 2370 to 2293 to transport Kirk off the Enterprise-B at the moment where he was believed lost, but the action caused an alternate timeline to form, erasing the Federation from history. The timeline was restored when Kirk was returned to the Nexus. 

Service history
After the losses of its maiden voyage, the Enterprise was commanded by Captain William George for a deep space tour beyond the Gourami Sector that mapped 142 star systems, and made 17 first contacts. In the late 2290s Captain Harriman again assumed command of the Enterprise. 

At some point during or after 2293, an Enterprise-B landing party under the command of Ensign Demora Sulu marches into an ambush by the Brevant race on Beta Orvis III, with Sulu nearly paying for her careless mistake with her life. 

In 2303, Captain John Harriman and Lieutenant Commander Demora Sulu depart the Enterprise-B at Starbase 23 under the guise of personal leave, but secretly head toward the Romulan Star Empire on a covert mission for Starfleet Intelligence to monitor for indications of advanced cloaking technology within Romulan space. Command of the starship is turned over to Captain Demián Rendón, with Harriman and Sulu being gone for eight weeks, displaced some 173 hours into the future due to a temporal encounter with a star designated "Odyssey." Harriman and his first officer return to Starbase 23 via the Foxtrot III monitoring station, and command of the starship is restored to Harriman. 

In 2307, Enterprise undergoes a rather extensive refit at Starbase 11, possibly bringing it up to the standards of the new Romulan vessels. Several significant crew-transfers also take place; among them the arrival of Boslic officer Xintal Linojj. At some point during this same year, both the Enterprise-B and USS Excelsior crews share an overlapping shore leave at Starbase 11. Not long afterward, the Enterprise's refit is completed, and the starship returns to active status. 

Captain Harriman remained in command of Enterprise until 2311, when the ship played a key role during the Tomed Incident. Following the incident, Harriman stepped down, and command was given to his first officer, Demora Sulu. 


 * Note: The Starfleet Operations Manual stated that John Harriman's tenure as captain of the Enterprise lasted five years (2293 to 2298). the has apparently retconned the 2293–2298 tour to William George, with Harriman's second command running 2298–2311.

In 2311, on her very first mission as captain of the Enterprise-B, Demora Sulu runs into unspecified trouble during a voyage to the Röntgen Wall. 

Sulu's first command of Enterprise lasted until 2315, when she took a leave of absence to care for her terminally-ill paternal grandmother. During this leave, Enterprise sets off on a year-long exploration mission, which is wildly successful, and earns the new captain a promotion to Admiral. Sulu then returned to the ship, and remained in command for several years thereafter. (SS TLE (Iron and Sacrifice))

On a mission to a moon in Desidera's Loop aboard the Enterprise-B prior to 2319, Demora Sulu narrowly escapes deaths by both drowning and hypothermia. 

In 2318, the Enterprise­-B under Captain Demora Sulu's command participates in a first contact mission on Beta Velara IV, but without the participation of freshly-certified contact specialist Hawkins Young. 

Starting in either late 2318 or early 2319, the Enterprise is assigned to explore an unclaimed, unaligned region of space near the Tzenkethi Coalition, and is ordered to avoid all contact when possible with Tzenkethi ships. With no return-date specified, the starship conducts exploratory missions in the region, equipped with ten Class-H shuttlecraft, two Gagarin-class warp shuttles, and a half-dozen cargo-management units. Two months into the voyage, a massive construct is discovered in the Jalidor Lambda star system, whose exploration ultimately costs the starship, among other things, the loss of a shuttlecraft, the Eriksson. 

Ten months pass by when the Enterprise discovers the planet Rejarris II located within this region, and, planetside, an interdimensional portal whose previous activation in 2308 resulted in the loss of the USS Excelsior (NCC-2000). Attempting to rescue a stranded crewman on a planet located in a parallel universe on the other side of the portal, Captain Demora Sulu herself becomes trapped there along with two of Enterprise's shuttlecraft (the Amundsen and Pytheas). Attempting to mount a rescue mission involving the Enterprise-B and the USS Cassiopeia, Admiral Harriman uses the Cassiopeia to destroy the Rejarris portal before an overwhelming Tzenkethi attack force can claim it, and crosses over into the parallel universe aboard Enterprise. Both Demora and Hikaru Sulu, as well as over five hundred stranded Excelsior crew, are rescued, and the Enterprise-B ultimately returns to its home universe (albeit some three weeks prior to the original discovery of the portal) after eleven months of transition-time using the "Odyssey" star. 

The ship's last commander was Captain Thomas Johnson Jr., who took command in the early 2320s. The ship's assignment under Johnson was patrol of the Cardassian border. The ship was therefore able to render assistance to Bajoran refugees in 2328, when Cardassia annexed Bajor. The following year, the ship was lost in deep space shortly after the crew contracted some unknown infection. 


 * Note: that has a different account of the 1701-B's demise. According the RPG Sourcebook, on reference stardate 2/9208.12, the Enterprise-B engaged two hostile battleships, a Klingon  and a Romulan, in the Triangle sector, about five parsecs from the space of the Imperial Klingon States. Both vessels were defeated, but the Enterprise was also lost with critical battle damage. The upshot of the encounter was the end of IKS activity in the area, as the rebel government could not afford to lose any more capital ships after two large-scale vessels were claimed by the Enterprise-battle.

USS Enterprise-B personnel

 * See: USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-B) personnel