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| SS Botany Bay |
One of the things that has always appealed to me about Star Trek is how all of the timeline and historical references fit together, an important part of the overall continuity of the multiple Trek TV series. From the beginning, the producers have worked hard to ensure that they remember what they have said previously, and everything (usually) holds together well.
So, this essay is based on many tidbits of what onscreen characters have said about 2018, and this general era in Star Trek history.
Star Trek is not in OUR Timeline
First, we have to admit that we do not live in the Star Trek universe. As early as the 1990s, things happened in Star Trek history that did not happen in our own. Specifically, the Eugenics Warshappened, in which genetically engineered "supermen" conquered a lot of countries and ruled as dictators. Khan was one of them.
The Eugenics Wars are a fixed point in time in Star Trek history. So what can we infer, based in this fact?
Humans, at least in one secret laboratory somewhere, had genetic engineering technology in the 20th Century that was already well in advance of what we have today. The Original Series referred to Khan as the result of "selective breeding" but The Wrath of Khan and later TV episodes amended that to "genetic engineering." Assuming that Khan and the supermen aged at normal speed (not TV magic rapid aging) means that somebody had advanced genetic engineering capability in the 1950s or 60s, which in our timeline we didn't have.
DY-100 Space Craft
We know that in 1996, the last of the supermen was overthrown, and Khan and 81 of his followers escaped Earth in the sublight DY-100 class SS Botany Bay. The Botany Bay, pictured above, appears to be a cargo ship, vaguely like the Hermes in The Martian, with detachable cargo pods. The Botany Bay was a sleeper ship, putting passengers in suspended animation for the months-long trip to Mars or other places int eh solar system.
Having an operational inter-planetary craft in 1996, with functional suspended animation, was certainly beyond what we were capable of in our own timeline. This implies that humans were capable of transporting heavy cargo to the Moon, Mars, and maybe other places (you don't need a sleeper ship to go to the Moon).
2018, "The Year Everything Changed"
In 2018 in the Star Trek universe, humans invented the first generation of Impulse Drive. Eventually, Impulse engines would be able to propel a starship close to the speed of light. Even the primitive 2018 first generation would likely have dropped the Mars trip to only weeks, or maybe even days.
(In our own timeline, a possible Electromagnatic Thuster is being tested. If it is proven to actually work, it might be something that could be scaled up to serve as our own version of an Impulse engine.)The consequences of Impulse Drive in the Trek universe are not discussed on screen but it is clear that a small fleet of DY-100 or similar DY-500 ships, upgraded to employ Impulse engines, would have opened up the solar system to exploration and eventually to colonization.
What Comes Next
In 2037, Earth launched a mission outside the solar system, the Charybdis, which was large enough to carry planetary shuttles and an extensive library, arriving in the Theta 116 star system in 2044. To achieve interstellar distances in seven years certainly required speeds close to the speed of light, i.e. Impulse Drive.
The 2030s is about the time when Zefram Cochrane was born, who would go on to invent Warp Drive in 2063, after a nuclear war a decade earlier. Within a few more years, the starship Valiant reached the "edge of the galaxy," a century before Kirk and Spock.
So, 2018 is a BIG turning point in the Star Trek parallel universe. Maybe it will also be in our own.
Image from: https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/bQgAAOSwTglYkpSy/s-l400.jpg
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