U.S.S. Miranda Technical details by Michael C. Rupprecht, Alex Rosenzweig and Memory Alpha]:

Miranda class Light Cruiser specifics:

Primary Hull:

01 Main Bridge, Ready Room

02 Executive Deck - First and Second Officers offices and Briefing room.

03 Senior Crew Quarters, Junior Crew Quarters, Crew Quarters, Social Sciences Department

04 VIP lounge, Officers Quarters, Arboretum, Quartermasters office, Mathematics and statistics laboratories, aeronautics and aquanautics labs, Main Deflector, Main Impulse Drive, Deuterium Tanks, Main Engineering

05 Officers mess, Gym, Swimming pool, Crew Quarters

06 Crewman and NCO quarters, Food synthesis equipment, Primary navigational deflector, Shuttlebays

07 Main deck - Sickbay, Transporter Room

08 Docking level - Docking ports, Aux fire control, Fabrication facility, Laundry, Reclamation, Anti-matter Storage, Cargo

09 Computer laboratory, Intelligence department, Temperature regulation Cargo

10 Circuit breaker deck Cargo

11 Main Sensor Array, Navigation dome

Length: 233 metres

Beam: 142 metres

Height: 58 metres

Crew: 223 [23 officers, 200 enlisted]

Cruising Warp 7 [OCU]

Max Warp 11 [OCU]

Maximum Speed: Warp 9.2 for 12 hours (new scale)

Armament: 6 dual type-7 phaser banks; 2 pulse phaser cannons; 4 photon torpedo launchers

Defences: Deflector shields

Miranda class was the evolution from the earlier Malachowski and Hoover classes of the 2250s. The success of those light cruiser designs led Starfleet to develop an improved version that was introduced in the 2260s. The new technology, new-build second batch of U.S.S. Miranda can be traced back to the year 2262. In the light of the technical advances that were being made, Starfleet had sought to upgrade the Hoover design, utilising these advances. The Miranda class was intended to be simply an improvement of Hoover class, but with increased mass and capabilities. NXP2262CL was the design selected by Starfleet as the testbed vessel to test this concept. U.S.S. Miranda, NX 1833, would be the pioneering member of the class.

Author’s notes: The appearance of NCC-1864 in TOS ‘Court Martial’ sets the Wrath of Khan design to the 2260s, being followed-up by Scotty on the larger Enterprise in 2270. TMP only speaks of 18 months re-designing and refitting the Enterprise; it never suggests Scotty came up with the technology, nor that the Enterprise is the first starship with this technology. White Coats in Starfleet Research & Development conceived the technology. Hoover class is established in ST: Discovery as the design prior to Miranda class. Miranda is thus a new-build vessel from the early 2260s that is constructed to the look of the Reliant of Star Trek II. The new technology is phased in over time via the Miranda class and USS Decatur, for the larger starships. I’ve kept to mentioning Hoover class and other canon starship designs, being careful to avoid fan designations. Whilst this shortens the list of starship designs slightly, it keeps me nearer to canon. The early Miranda class examples could have the more retro-looking bridge module from the Bozeman. It also explains the Bozeman looking like a Miranda class and being decommissioned by 2288.

Miranda class – named after Prospero's daughter in Shakespeare's "The Tempest" - would use ASDB's new configurable workstations and Daystrom Duotronic III with M-9 Multitronic supplement. Her primary shakedown mission would be to test one of the most important aspects of the Miranda class: Modularity; the interchangeable and removeable elements which allow the class to be utilised for a wide variety of missions. U.S.S. Miranda and her sisters had a state-of-the-art torpedo/sensor roll-bar assembly mounted on her dorsal hull. This roll-bar array produced impressive results with negligible effects on the performance of the starship. The additional benefit was the lack of requiring an extended aft hull, allowing additional space for shuttle bays. The success of NX 1833 immediately led to further starships of this new class, such as NCC numbers 1835 Rutherford, 1837 Lantree, 1842 Alexandra and 1864 Reliant (seen in service by 2267).

U.S.S. Miranda spawned other variant designs such as the Soyuz class, Endurance class and Antares class. The Soyuz class was a short-lived variation with an extended aft hull with sensor arrays. This was phased out in the late 2280s for the newer Endurance class. The plug-in-and-play aspects of the Miranda class made it the flexible light cruiser design that Starfleet both wanted and needed. The crew compliment was 220 with four shuttlecraft. For long-range scientific surveys, the 50 photon torpedoes aboard could be reconfigured quickly as deep-space probes. Starfleet was able to decommission the aging Hoover class, or reallocate them to secondary duties.

U.S.S. Reliant - NCC 1864 - was destroyed in 2285 during a classified mission, U.S.S. Saratoga - NCC 1887 - was disabled by a whaleprobe in 2286. Today, Starfleet has commissioned the first of the Flight 2a Miranda class starships: Neptune and Venerable. The design is set to last in service well into the latter years of the 24th Century.

Miranda class history based upon the history created by Alex Rosenzweig for the Miranda class blueprints, Memory Alpha website entry for the Miranda class starship and the startrek.com entries for the various starships.
Used with permission of Alex Rosenzweig. Copyright © 1999 All Rights Reserved.

Miranda class members currently (not extensive)

Sheffield	1976		Star Trek: The Interim Years
La Fayette	6992		Star Trek: The Interim Years
Surcouf	6996		Star Trek: The Interim Years
Amagi	6997		Star Trek: The Interim Years
Chen Du	6998	Commanded by Captain Viktor Lebed	Star Trek: The Interim Years

Author's Notes:

N.X. 1833 was selected for U.S.S. Miranda in the absence of any canon registry number. The backstory of the Avenger becoming the refit class leader is a minor change to the class history in Alex Rosenzweig and Michael Rupprecht's Miranda class blueprints, created in conjunction with Alex's work on the 'Starship Spotter' book. The Miranda class must be a very good design, since we still see them in service right up to the end of Deep Space 9, some one hundred years after the first of the class was commissioned.

Miranda class is the workhorse of the Starfleet. I always envisioned the Miranda class as being the starship class that would be seen the most, with the exception of the multitude of Oberth class vessels around at the time. Miranda class starship models have been seen throughout the Star Trek franchise since their first appearance as the U.S.S. Reliant in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Since then the Miranda class has appeared as the U.S.S. Saratoga (NCC 1887) in Star Trek IV, the U.S.S. Lantree (NCC 1837) in Unnecessary Selection [TNG season 2, minus rollbar after the rollbar wiring developed a short], the Brattain (NCC 21166) in Night Terrors [TNG season 4, with rollbar again], configured with modifications as the Soyuz class Bozemen - a ship she was to reappear twice more as in Miranda class configuration, as the Saratoga (NCC 31911) in Emissary [DS9 pilot, minus rollbar again but with outboard sensor pod] and as numerous vessels during the Dominion war including the Nautilus (NCC 31910) and Majestic (NCC 31060).

The background to the development of the Miranda class is shrouded in both canon and fan histories. Various precursor classes including Soyuz, Surya and Avenger class have been mentioned. Certainly it seems likely that Miranda class is a refit design from an earlier frigate class. Miranda class plans by Michael C. Rupprecht and Alex Rosenzweig make a great mention of the Avenger class as being the precursor to the Miranda class. Click on the dedication plaque for the U.S.S. Miranda to go to their comprehensive site. Star Trek: Equinox has a lower registry vessel as Miranda class (NCC-1832), a simple explanation was the construction/conversion of this vessel was delayed, hence Miranda is class vessel.

I have utilised the history of Alex - with his kind permission - to generate the history of the Miranda class. I have integrated the histories of Soyuz and Miranda classes to come up with a history of competing designs for the successor of unrefit Soyuz class, resulting in the eventual Miranda class. This mirrors such contemporary aircraft development as the YF-22 vs 23, YAH 63 vs 64 and YF32 vs 35.

NCC 1975 U.S.S. Ranger and NCC 1976 U.S.S. Sheffield have been added to the Miranda class history to fit with both my own website and with the appearance of U.S.S. Ranger on Interplay Games' Star Trek: New Worlds website. Curious coincidence put the two vessels registries concurrent and thus I thought they must have been ordered as replacements for Reliant and to be used to assess Intelligence gathering equipment for Starfleet Intelligence. Fandom previously put these as Coronado class, I am ignoring this in the face of New Worlds and established Sheffield NCC registration [I'm sure there's a good excuse!].

A fan history of the Miranda class has made it into the realms of semi-canon via Alex Rosenzweig's involvement in the book 'Starship Spotter'. In the book he has compromised to mention that 'The success of the Miranda-class design began even before the U.S.S. Miranda was completed. The unique spaceframe concept was applied to a refit program for an existing fleet of frigates'. This carefully avoids the issue of the name of the original frigate starship class, Surya, or the refit program, Avenger. Surya is the Hindu Sun God, and has its origin in fandom. The frigate becoming the cruiser design was an easy one. H.M.S. Daring, the new Type 45 destroyer doyen, is classed as a destroyer. Her size, tonnage and capabilities clearly make her a light cruiser. By the same token, Miranda's size and capability after the frigate design is refit becomes a light cruiser. I have therefore managed to keep consistant with canon and avoid mention of the fanon terms of Surya or Avenger class.

In an article about the Constellation in Star Trek: The Magazine, Rick Sternbach conjectures that there was indeed no "TOS Miranda", albeit only in a side note. He writes: "When the Miranda and Soyuz classes also became major out growths of the refit program, the production lines expanded, ultimately involving a total of three Starfleet yards." After there had been a misunderstanding about this statement, Rick confirmed in an e-mail to Kris Olinger that this statement really referred to the Constitution refit program, so Miranda and Soyuz are new classes. As a result of this comment that the Miranda is an offshoot of the Constitution refit and the appearance of a TOS era Miranda class U.S.S. Bombay (in David Mack's Star Trek: Vanguard series of novels), I had to find a way to 'have my cake and eat it'. I originally decided that Bombay would be a proto-Miranda class, of the frigate design with no rollbar - very much like the Surya or Coventry class starships of "Ships of the Starfleet Volume One" - however, this was to change in November 2007 with the advent of a derelist starship in David Gerrold's 'Blood and Fire'.

Star Trek: Phase Two had an episode, 'Blood and Fire', which features an Original Series Miranda class starship. NCC 1893, U.S.S. Copernicus, features in the episode as a derelict starship encountered by the Enterprise. David Gerrold and James Cawley approved the final version, which was rendered by Joel Bellucci. The final version - with 223 officers and crew aboard - has a rollbar with a secondary hull, complete with hanger bay and cargo bays along with the deflector and Phase Two series-style torpedo tubes. This, then is the definitive pre-refit version of the Miranda class as I see it. A refit program in the 2270s, based on the Enterprise refit naturally follows.

With the Constitution class having members such as Potemkin (1657) and Republic (1371) with registry numbers lower than the lead ship Constitution (1700), I found it easy to justify having ships such as Archer (1275) and Mayflower (1621) with registries lower than the Miranda (1833). JJ Abrams Star Trek (2009) also featured the USS Mayflower which was obviously a Miranda class design. In the prime universe there had to be an equivalent starship and therefore she was part of the unrefit Miranda class. The new Star Trek: Online game features various Miranda class variants, showing how the design will survive to the 25th Century, yet still retain the designation Miranda class. Enterprise was the first of the Constitution class to be refit in 2272-2273, yet the class was still known as Constitution class (refit). So Miranda class will keep her title, regardless of Avenger being refit first.

The crew compliment of Miranda class has been a matter of debate for a long time. The figures I have settled for are based on a number of sources: Bjo Trimble's Star Trek Concordance states the U.S.S. Reliant had 200 crew, The DS9 Technical Manual by Herman Zimmerman, Rick Sternbach and Doug Drexler states 220 officers and crew standard with 500 maximum. The Miranda class blueprints by Alex Rosenzweig and Michael Rupprecht has a figure of 360 - 91 officers and 269 crew, as used in the Ships of the Starfleet Volume One. Since the DS9 Tech manual states an evacuation limit of 500, it is not out of the realm of possibility to have 220 crew, a maximum berthing capability for standard crew of 360 and a maximum evacuation limit (using all available space) for 500.The breakdown of officers and men is based on the general ratio in the Royal Navy of 10 enlisted personnel to each officer - approximately. The 223 figure is taken from the one used for Star Trek: Phase Two's U.S.S. Copernicus. For the TOS Equinox the stas are given as: Captain Stephen McCabe, Length: 213.37 M, Width: 111.30 M, Height: 53.10 M, Decks: 9, Crew: 100 to 160. Weapons: 7x dual phaser banks, 4x single phaser banks, 2x photon torpedo launchers (forward facing only).