Pathfinder (Star Trek)
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- For other meanings see the Pathfinder disambiguation page.
- For the Star Trek: Voyager episode, see Pathfinder (Voyager episode).
In the fictional universe of Star Trek, a pathfinder is the first starship of a class of ships, conceptually similar to the lead ship concept of Earth's navies. Potential pathfinders are each assigned a registry number beginning with an 'NX' prefix; if a pathfinder is found to be satisfactory, the prefix is replaced with 'NCC' and a class based upon or identical to it is put into production. In some cases, a pathfinder ship can be modified into a considerably different design; the original pathfinder ship for the Defiant class heavy escort was modified into the USS Nova, lead ship of the Nova class.
The pathfinder's name is usually identical to the class name.
An example of both these facts is the pathfinder of the Excelsior class USS Excelsior, designated NX-2000 immediately after its commission, to later be redesignated NCC-2000.
(Star Trek III: The Search for Spock and Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country)
Pathfinder was also the codename of a project to locate the Starship Voyager when the ship was lost in the Delta Quadrant. Reginald Barclay, formerly of the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-D), was a member of the team and successfully initiated contact with Voyager's crew in 2376.