The Danube class began life in my mind as basically a big shuttlecraft, but over time these ships seem to have grown and grown! Realizing that there was a big compartment in the back and a detachable module in the middle was the first change in my perception; when Runabouts turned out to have photon torpedo tubes I began to think they must be fifty or sixty metres long just to fit that in, but I think there must be some sort of photon mini-torp for runabouts. Then in "For the Uniform" we see Sisko on board his Runabout in a jefferies tube!

Using the nice big scale diagrams in the new Encyclopedia I got a length of under 30 metres; I guess a lot of the stuff in a Runabout must be *very* compact!

In case you didn't know, Sisko names DS9's Runabouts as they arrive at the station. He traditionally picks the names of great rivers for his Runabouts.

December 4th Update :

After prodding from various people, most recently Tommy Tennebo, I have updated the Runabout page to include various details from the DS9 Tech Manual. I still strongly believe that this book can't be fully trusted, and naturally such a source is not canon, hence most of the entry has now gone to green for backstage info. I've kept the phasers as Type IV's rather than the Type VI's that some sources list, simply because the latter seem too high for a ship this size. The speeds I have also kept, and I've extended the life span up to sixty years.

Lengthwise, I found a nit myself for once - the specs page had 27 metres, the size comparison had 23.1. Guess I forgot to update the specs page when I did the size comparison, so that's now fixed.
 

Last updated : 4th December 1999.
This page is Copyright Graham Kennedy 1998.

Star Trek et al is Copyright Paramount Pictures 1996/97.
No Copyright  infringement is intended and this page is for personal use only.
All  of the above classes of star ships and all of the
named ships are copyright Paramount 1996/97.