MarsGuard Blackhawk Class Destroyer MGSC William Clark on trials between Mars and the asteroid belt Class History The Blackhawk Class Destroyer had a bizarre genesis. Originally, these vessels were to be LTV-Yutani Heavy Industries of Mars civilian explorer vessels, capable of being on missions for more than a year. After Mars gained independance in late 2261, a call was put out by the Mars Council governing body for any and all ships that would be able to form the bulk of the MarsGuard. Various mega-corporations on Mars come to the aid of the new government, though they are not driven by a sense of patriotism, but rather the bottom line. Hefty tax incentives and aid are promised in exchange for helping Mars build a homegrown defense force. LTV-Yutani Heavy Industries was one of the larger contributors to the effort. Not only were they able to provide defense systems and leases on orbital facilities, they also offered Mars's first domestically built capital ship. LTV-Yutani had an inhouse project to build long-range explorer craft to help them find and exploit new resources. When Mars put out the call, constrution of the third thru fifth hulls was halted while a redesign was studied. Work resumed on the third hull when it was determined more of it would have to be dismantled than not to fit the new military design. It was completed as a standard Searcher Class explorer. The other two vessels, along with a third in the early stages of main component assembly, were completed to the new Destroyer design. The forward hull was completely redesigned, and the resemblance to the EA's Omega Class Destroyer was more than pure coincidence. Former members of the Omega design team had come to work for LTV-Yutani and found the easiest way to design a warship was to go with what they knew. The Blackhawk was radically different from the Searcher. Its weapons layout was vaguely similar to the Omega which it resembled, but it had domestically produced weapons systems on board. In an interesting application of Mars produced weapons, United Dynamics produced a close-in weapons system based on their fighter weapon, the uni-pulse cannon. This weapons system actually replaced the interceptors on all Earth Alliance and Belt Alliance vessels sold or given to Mars (the interceptors having been removed by the originator). The weapons mounts varied between the three ships of the class. The Blackhawk had four Combat Particle Cannons (United Dynamics built) and a railgun as main arament. The Meriwether Lewis had the four combat particle cannons and railgun as well, but had dual unipulse cannons replacing the standard particle beams. The William Clark had heavy laser cannons replacing the combat particle cannons, and a rail cannon replacing the railgun. The already spacious hangar of the Searcher was made even more so by the redesign of the hull. Cargo bays were removed, and the structure enhanced and enlarged. The hangar was now able to embark half a squadron of medium figthers (Raptors or Sabres), one squadron of light figthers (Freedoms or Delta-V's), two shuttles, two SWAC shuttles, and two of the Enforcer armed boarding craft. The ship maintained the Searcher's rotating section, though more armored and reinforced for combat maneuvering. Overall, the ships were painted in greens and other dark colors before being handed over to MarsGuard, who repainted the vessels in standard colors (think late 20th, early 21st century US Coast Guard pattern). The ships were to occasionally deploy with a small escort of Cowpens destroyer escorts for joint maneuvers with the EA or IA, but the Drakh attack in 2267 changed that, at least for a little while. The Blackhawks were pushed into service to protect the entire Sol system, as were all MarsGuard ships. Once the Drakh threat had ended, they returned to their intended role of patrolling the space above and around Mars. (Note: This design is based on a model I found at Starshipmodeler.com's readers' gallery. It was of a ship that was based on the Omega from B5, and built for one of the contests over at the site. I photoshopped the above pic so that it looked barely like the ship was in space and not mounted on a wooden board.) MGSC Blackhawk SCS MGSC Lewis SCS MGSC Clark SCS