Freelance Traveller

Earth Alliance Light Shuttle

by Richard Page

This article originally appeared in the August 2012 issue of Freelance Traveller.

Deck Plan Key (for all variants pictured)

The Earth Alliance Light Shuttle is one of the most common small craft seen in the Earth Alliance and its colonies. It is not only used by the Earth Alliance military in several forms, but it is also used by many civilian operators as well. The standard STG-19 Hammond-class Light Shuttle has been in service for the last 40 years in one form or another – the current military model is the STG-19e version, which differs only slightly from the original design or from the subsequent civilian ones.

Features

Firmpoints: Each Shuttle is equipped with 2 pairs of Firmpoints (0.5T, 0.2 MCr per pair) which can be used to attach different types of modules to the shuttle. Each pair of Firmpoints are on either side of the shuttle and must use the same type of attached module (for example, you could fix 2 fuel modules to the front pair and 2 cargo modules to the rear pair). If you have any modules attached to a shuttle, the hull counts as being distributed rather than standard. The 2 most common modules used are 5T cargo and fuel modules (not interchangeable – you can’t use the cargo ones for fuel and vice-versa), which cost 0.01 MCr empty, have negligible mass and hold either 5T of cargo or fuel respectively.

Landing Struts: Landing Struts – The STG-19 Shuttles are designed to operate from ships, stations and prepared landing areas. Because of this, the landing struts are unsuitable for landing on unprepared or uneven ground. An ‘All-Terrain’ extendable landing pad system is available – it takes up 1T of cargo space and costs 0.2 MCr.

Other Features: Each light shuttle is usually equipped with 2 or more lockers for EVA suits (located near the airlock), as well as many small compartments located in the overhead area or under seats to store light hand luggage. The galley is suitable for preparing light meals, snacks and hot or cold drinks suitable for zero-g consumption from pre-packaged stores.

Standard Variants

Although the light shuttle is not modular, it lends itself to different configurations quite readily and there are several different variants of this shuttle available as standard. The most common ones are:

STG-19e Military Shuttle: removes 10T of fuel and 2T of cargo in exchange for 8T of reinforced hull and 4T of reinforced structure. Add +1 point of Hull and Structure for +1.6 MCr. This model may be armed with a single light pulse cannon for +1 MCr, losing an extra 1T of cargo space to do so. This configuration is not available for civilian use.

STG-19p Passenger/Crew Shuttle: this configuration converts 11T of cargo space into cramped seating for 22 passengers (uses 0.5T and 0.3 MCr per passenger) at a cost of +0.66 MCr.

STG-19l Long-range Shuttle: somewhat of a misnomer, this configuration adds 2 basic double-occupancy staterooms, 2 seats and +5T of fuel by reducing the cargo area by 14T at a cost of +1.6 MCr.

Both the STG-19p and STG-19l configurations can be modified with the same reinforcements and armament as the STG-19e, at the indicated costs/penalties (Military availability only; designations become STG-19ep and STG-19el respectively).