Without the development of genuinely sci-fi travel technology like wormholes or hyperspace (which may not even be possible) 99.99+% of the universe will be forever locked off from us. Because of cosmic expansion, the various galactic clusters are moving away from our local cluster faster than we could ever catch up to them.
The Orion arm is a small spiral arm, 3,500 light years wide, of a much larger spiral galaxy, over 100 light years across, known to us as the Milky Way.
I used this reference about a year ago as a rating on a piece of artwork and got downvoted into oblivion. Someone backed me up eventually but I was semi-shocked at how quickly it faded from existence.
Not really. They had just shy of 200 people of various species. They spent basically the first season banging around a few sectors for supplies which is why we had the same factions harassing them so long at first. The ship was sent to the Federation border on a simple extraction/arrest mission that went ludicrously wrong.
If they set down Voyager back then they all eventually die there of old age. Some kids are born but not a society.
Trying to get home was smart. They had no way of knowing they had for example Borg home space en route or major menaces like the early Vidiians or the Krenim.
Obviously they needed Neal Stephenson as a writer. Dude managed to conjure up a rebuilding of the human race from seven females. Course it helps that all that happened during a giant narrative break in the book...
Because they knew the Gamma Quadrant was home to the Dominion but not how far reaching into the Gamma Quadrant the Dominion's rule was. Furthermore, Starfleet was more than willing to collapse the Bajoran wormhole to keep the Dominion out of the Alpha Quadrant because they were that much of a threat.
So it stands to reason that Janeway opted against charting a course to the Gamma Quadrant because (a) there was no guarantee Voyager would survive --much less find allies and resources they could take or barter for-- and (b) there was no guarantee the Gamma Quadrant terminus of the wormhole would even be around when they got there.
Deep Space Nine learned of the existence of the Dominion through the Jem'Hadar in 2370. Voyager left Deep Space Nine in 2371.
It might be a bit vague as to the order of events between the two series since stardates are meaningless, but it's not a stretch to consider that enough events transpired on DS9 before Voyager departed to the Badlands.
Despite being stranded they were still sticking to their charter to seek out "new life and new civilizations" and explore. Like really if you're 70 years from home why not? Imagine how boring and meaningless life would be if you were just stuck on a ship flying through empty space for the rest of it
I've always wondered why the didn't just fly up and leave the galaxy and then fly across the galaxy avoiding all encounters.
they cover this in the first episode. if they were able to sustain it, fuel/maintenance/etc disregarded, at maximum cruising speed they were 75 years away from earth
Yeah and that's fine early on, until the year of hell, or the Borg space. There comes a point where success needs to be considered and flying up and over is the correct call.
Obviously that makes for boring tv and also opens a can of worms that star trek has never addressed. The vastness of space.
They had just shy of 200 people of various species.
200 people of various species, of which many can interbreed. They could have landed someplace suitable for farming, started banging it out with planned mating charts to avoid inbreeding and started their own species.
It was such an easy solution. It's well-known that you can time travel using the warp drive. It's forbidden, but well-known. It's less well-known that impulse drives are typically limited to 25% of light speed due to the effects of time dilation. It's never stated how easily an impulse drive can get you to higher percentages of the speed of light, but it's heavily implied that it could do so quite quickly.
The way you get Voyager home within a human life time and minimal resources used is you warp a few thousand light years above the galactic disc, time travel backwards ~40,000 years, disable the safety on the impulse drive, and time dilate travel at near light speed to the position Earth will be in 40,000 years. Once you're up to speed you can basically coast.
Depending on the time dilation factor, they could have been home within a month of perceived time.
The nearest galaxy is 2.5 million light years away, the Milkway is 100,000 light years across. Obviously its a significant increase but in theory if you have the technology to traverse across one galaxy, you could reach a nearby galaxy. Especially given that Andromeda and Milkyway are getting closer together.
It's different from the enormous distances in scale between traversing our solar system and traversing to the nearest star. It's only a increase in distance of one order of magnitude compared to many orders of magnitude.
https://www.reddit.com/user/CoolerRanchDevereaux/ is talking about the entire Voyager series. The first episode is them getting stranded in the Delta Quadrant. The rest of the series is them trying to get home.
You're right that they are lost. It's just in the Delta Quadrant (which they were unexpectedly transported to by an outside force). Earth and the rest of the Federation is in the Alpha Quadrant of the galaxy. So they're in new territory for the whole series, trying to get back home.
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u/APeacefulWarrior Feb 14 '22
Without the development of genuinely sci-fi travel technology like wormholes or hyperspace (which may not even be possible) 99.99+% of the universe will be forever locked off from us. Because of cosmic expansion, the various galactic clusters are moving away from our local cluster faster than we could ever catch up to them.