[Stryker]

If you haven't seen "Star Wars The Last Jedi", then you probably wouldn't get this but in that movie a Rebellion Cruiser went to lightspeed and tore through Snokes Mega Star Destroyer and obliterated several other ships. aka Lightspeed ramming...

But... this wasn't the first movie that conceived the idea technically. If you watch the below clip of "Star Trek TNG Best of Both Worlds Part II" you'll notice Captain Riker orders Wesley Crusher a collision course with the Borg Cube then asks Geordi LaForge to prepare to go to warp speed... Though we obviously never see that because of different choices made. It is interesting to note that the imagination could only wonder what a Galaxy Class ship could do to a Borg Cube if it had went to warp and right into it... Suppose we will never know. Enjoy the clip!



Open the floor to discussion.

[Bridger]

In Best of Both Worlds Part I the Enterprise wanted to escape with Warp 9 but the Cube could hold her in place why should have it been any different in part II.

[Stryker]

In Best of Both Worlds Part I the Enterprise wanted to escape with Warp 9 but the Cube could hold her in place why should have it been any different in part II.

Riker ordered a collision course and was going to go to warp power to stop the Borg. I'd say that is different.

[Bridger]

Riker ordered a collision course and was going to go to warp power to stop the Borg. I'd say that is different.

In what way, if the Cube can hold the ship in place it can old the ship in place.

[Stryker]

In what way, if the Cube can hold the ship in place it can old the ship in place.

There's no way to tell, it's possible that going to warp could cause stress on the tractor beam for to break. It could also cause the Enterprise to explode in place. We'll never know. But the idea in itself is of curiosity, to go to warp in a collision course makes one wonder what damage it could do. Let's set aside the tractor beam from the show. What kind of damage would we be looking at had the Enterprise warp speed rammed a Borg Cube?

[Bridger]

There's no way to tell, it's possible that going to warp could cause stress on the tractor beam for to break. It could also cause the Enterprise to explode in place. We'll never know. But the idea in itself is of curiosity, to go to warp in a collision course makes one wonder what damage it could do. Let's set aside the tractor beam from the show. What kind of damage would we be looking at had the Enterprise warp speed rammed a Borg Cube?

Ok let's assume the Tractor Beam could not hold the ship in place, the Enterprise had already lost it shields at the point Riker ordered the collision course the Cube was at full power so in worst case the Enterprise would do no damage at all or it would rip a hole into it's hull something that would not stop the Borg considering the size of the TNG Cube not much damage would be done.

[Sul-Matuul]

I’m fairly certain that if the Enterprise was able to go to warp even at exactly light speed it would utterly annihilate the Borg cube if they collided.

The Enterprise has a mass of around 5 million metric tonnes; that much mass going at the speed of light has got nearly 500 quintillion megajoules of energy behind it. I doubt there’s a starship anywhere in the franchise that could withstand that amount of energy impacting it all at once.

[Solace]

Ok let's assume the Tractor Beam could not hold the ship in place, the Enterprise had already lost it shields at the point Riker ordered the collision course the Cube was at full power so in worst case the Enterprise would do no damage at all or it would rip a hole into it's hull something that would not stop the Borg considering the size of the TNG Cube not much damage would be done.

While that is the likely outcome. I prefer to speculate that what would happen would be a massive hole ripped into the Cube and then a massive secondary Antimatter Explosion from the Enterprise's Warp Core going boom at the point of impact. Either way that kind of damage would have been devastating for the Borg cube and likely would have resulted in their own systems overloading causing additional damage.

[Morris]

Theoretically, the Enterprise would have very little, to no momentum inside the warp field. The space being compressed in front of the Enterprise would compress and shred the part of the Borg cube that it came in contact with. This debris would pass through the warp 'bubble' into the space around the Enterprise, but likely with little to no momentum. So, the space inside the Enterprise's warp 'bubble' would get very crowded, very quickly. The damage to the Enterprise would depend on the strength of her hull, compared to the containment ability of the warp 'bubble'. It's possible that the Borg debris just gets packed around the Enterprise, then when the warp 'bubble' is full, either the Enterprise gets compressed in the Borg debris, or the Borg debris just gets ejected out the back end of the warp 'bubble', leaving the Enterprise scraped up, but intact. The deflector may have some impact on this result as well, but I'm not really sure how much, as it's not designed for dealing with much beyond space dust, as far as I know.

Something to think about.

Edit...to Bridger's point, the Borg have already demonstrated the ability to 'hold' the Enterprise, preventing the formation of a warp field, which would make everything else a moot point...assuming that the Federation doesn't have a counter to that now.

[Bridger]

If we follow Starfleets analysis of the Borg back than 78% of the Cube would have to be destroyed to take the Cube out and look at the size difference the Enterprise is tiny.



Also if we look at the source you mention from Star Wars The Last Jedi as far as I know the ship was not destroyed and later evacuated and scuttled by it's crew.

[Morris]

If we follow Starfleets analysis of the Borg back than 78% of the Cube would have to be destroyed to take the Cube out and look at the size difference the Enterprise is tiny.

The Enterprise's size doesn't matter, as long as they can form a warp field, and that said field can be made large enough to debilitate the cube. That would be the challenge.

[Bridger]

The Enterprise's size doesn't matter, as long as they can form a warp field, and that said field can be made large enough to debilitate the cube. That would be the challenge.

They could not even run their Super Weapon longer than a few seconds before the Core would breach and if we look at Enterprise, the Columbia could barley extend it's Warp Field to support a super close flying Enterprise how would the Enterprise be able to extend it do damage that ship.

The might be able to do extend it for another ship of its size but not a Cube and once the Enterprise would be hit by debree on any place, Saucer, Deflector or Engines by by Warpfield best example the Mebourne and Odyssey.

[Stryker]

Now this is some interesting discussion and theories.

We did get to see what a warp core explosion looked several times in TNG, i.e. "Cause and Effect", "Time Squared, "Timescape", "Parallels", "All Good Things" and lastly "ST Generations" which probably had the best looking shockwave explosion. The best debris type explosion goes to "Cause and Effect" probably because it was a model that was blown up.

But judging from those core explosion suffice to say as some mentioned I would suspect the Borg Cube would sustain heavy damage and might even become unstable itself. Consider if any of the key Borg systems were hit could cause a chain reaction effect. In "First Contact" Picard ordered Quantum Torpedoes at a particular spot and it disrupted the cube enough to cause chain explosion reaction. I would hypothesize that a ship could trigger the same depending where it impacts and with a warp core explosion.

[Morris]

They could not even run their Super Weapon longer than a few seconds before the Core would breach and if we look at Enterprise, the Columbia could barley extend it's Warp Field to support a super close flying Enterprise how would the Enterprise be able to extend it do damage that ship.

The might be able to do extend it for another ship of its size but not a Cube and once the Enterprise would be hit by debree on any place, Saucer, Deflector or Engines by by Warpfield best example the Mebourne and Odyssey.

The NX-01 and NX-02 were first gen warp 5 ships. The Enterprise-E has a significantly more powerful warp core. I imagine that it could do better than an NX could, but that was the point of my previous statement...IF they could generate a warp field large enough. I agree with you. I don't think that they could, but I don't think that you can use the NX as proof. It's just so old, compared to the Sovereign class. The rest of my statements are just spelling what could happen, if you warped into a Borg cube, and what would have to happen to debilitate it. I imagine, with a well targeted warp, the Enterprise-E may be able to disable the cube, but without causing a core breach in the cube (whether it's the cube's core, or the Enterprise's), I don't believe that they could destroy the cube.

Edit...regarding the last point in your post, if the collision did collapse the warp field, and destroy the Enterprise, as long as the Enterprise's core breaches, the cube is done for, as the Enterprise is presumably inside of the cube at that point, at least to some degree, and that should be enough to destroy the cube.

[Pedigo]

The "technology" behind the Star Wars FTL drive and Star Trek FTL drive may make a difference. In Star Wars, they jump from point to point at FTL while avoiding objects in space. Maybe relativity and physics work slightly different in that galaxy allowing true lightspeed to be obtained via their hyperspace drive. In that case, I could see how an object traveling at FTL speed would rip apart just about anything. The amount of energy behind that would be tremendous.

However, intentionally running into an object at lightspeed may not work in the Star Trek universe. Star Trek's technology seems closer to the real world theory of the Alcubierre Drive. In that, the ship isn't traveling lightspeed but is rather moving space and time around it so it effectively moves at lightyear distances but remains stationary inside the warp bubble. So would the ship even collide with matter outside the bubble or would it simple pass through or around it?

Perhaps Riker was planning on a warp core breach upon impact, an attempt at the Picard Maneuver to buy time for escape, or maybe it's just a line not fully thought out by geeky producers.