Research Vessel Gun (RV Crane)

Model: Weyland Yutani Prometheus Class Research Vessel Crew: 9 (skeleton 5); 8 deluxe cabins & captains cabin Passengers: 33; 32 single & 1 suite (up to 3x in an emergency) Cargo: 920 m3 (460 tons) Handling (good, +3); Acceleration (good, +3), Hull (great, +4) Aspects: Older, but fully refurbished. Heavy duty. Long range. Comfortable and roomy. State of the art equipment.

The Ship:
The Prometheus Class has five decks, each with a different function. They are (from the bottom up) cargo, engineering, science and operations, accommodation, and communications and sensors. The levels are separated by airlock sealed staircases. There is one elevator connecting all decks. The ship is extensively compartmentalized to control damage in the event the ship is hit, a special feature added for operations in asteroid belts. Cargo section is an innovative design. The entire cargo bay is lowered from the ships belly after landing. Two loading ramps then allow quick and easy loading. The cargo bay has a 16 ft high ceiling. It carries five medium duty exploration rovers, two heavy duty mineral extractors and four quad-tracked runabouts. There is room for several containers of mission specific cargo. Engineering encompasses the second deck. It houses the upper part of the cargo bay, fusion reactor, workshops and fuel tanks. The central deck is devoted to science and operations. The bridge has armoured glass windscreens on three sides and the floor. During interplanetary flight, it is protected by retractable hull plating. For atmospheric ops, the plating is retracted and to give an unobstructed 270 degree view side-to-side and 135 degree view ahead, down and back. Directly behind the bridge is an operation planning room with a large holographic map table and two Extra-Vehicular Activity (EVA) rooms, with spacesuits and single person escape pods. There are labs, research workspaces, and a fully stocked sick bay with an advanced med-pod and isolation rooms. This deck also includes an open concept mess hall / crew lounge, kitchen, greenhouses and well-equipped gym. The accommodations level is designed for long duration cruises. The ships cockpit is used during interplanetary voyages and is connected to the bridge below by a ladder. There are 32 private cabins for passengers. The deck is divided by the massive main axle connecting the two tilt arms supporting the ships four independently steerable engines. Each engine includes four extendable landing gear. The tilt arms are mostly mechanical spaces, but have access passages inside them. Behind the axle are eight deluxe crew cabins and a suite for the owner-aboard. Communications and sensors are located on the uppermost deck. The ships sensor grid is based on military scout ship technology only recently made available to a select few Alliance friendly corporations since the end of the war. Two former labs have been converted into a meditation room and a library (stocked with actual books, mostly about religion). The ships long range (Verse-wide) top-of-the-line Cortex service provider base station has ultra-wideband up and downlink capabilities. It is paired with a university grade super-computer cluster, officially for science purposes. Unofficially, it has excellent code breaking and hacking capabilities. The ships two 30 person lifeboats face aft. Overall, the ship is roomy and comfortable. The corridors are wide; the rooms are tall and well lit. The generous amount of private and public space is designed to reduce claustrophobia and keep the crew happy on multi-month long deployments. The sensors, laboratories and communications are optimized for explorations far out on the Rim. Cargo space is more than sufficient for vehicles, mission specific equipment and consumables, but the Prometheus class is not designed as, nor is it cost-efficient as, a cargo hauler.

History:
This class of ship is built by Weyland Yutani shipyards as research vessels. They are used for science and exploration, mainly looking for new sources of exploitable resources (on planets, moons and asteroids). They have been sold to many companies and remain a popular model. Their heavy duty construction makes them extremely durable, with a long service life. This particular ship, hull 681-A-LR, was built in 2484. The A designation indicates its hull was hardened for working in asteroid fields. The LR notes it is a long range model with enlarged fuel tanks and additional life support and food storage. She was purchased by Tiger Interplanetary Resources. T.I.R.s focus is on mining the vast asteroid belts of the Red Sun. They named the ship Tiger Claw 6, in line with the five other Prometheus Class ships already in their service. Following in the footsteps of its five sister ships, Tiger Claw 6 spent twenty years prospecting asteroids. In 2504, the ship was retired and replaced. She spent two years in mothballs. When the Unification War started in 2506, she was reactivated and hijacked from the storage depot by a team of Independents. She was used as an unarmed scout for two years before being cornered and captured. The ship was impounded and sold off after the war. The ship was sold to a starship speculator from Liann Jiun, by the name of Don Beattie. Despite being 28 years old, the ships primary systems, engines and hull were in good shape. He invested a significant amount of money to fully refurbish the ship. Every major system was stripped down and completely overhauled. By the time he was done, the ship was internally like new. Externally, the hull still has her original profile. Unfortunately, Beattie had misjudged his market. Six months before the overhaul was finished, an updated Prometheus entered the market. Shipyards modernized and expanded to build ships for the war were now hungry for work and the new class was just as capable, but cheaper to buy and more economical to operate. Hull 681-A-LR sat unsold for three years before Beattie went bankrupt. His assets were sold at auction. The ship ended up at a starship wholesaler. There was little interest in it until it was bought by a small resource exploration start-up company from Londinium. They paid cash. The ship was moved to a shipyard that specialized in custom work. She got a routine overhaul, cabin reconfiguration and had new state-of-the-art equipment installed. The ship was renamed the Research Vessel (RV) Gun (Crane in Chinese); the stated intention is to use the ship for prospecting.