Blue Alert (Star Trek)

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Blue Alert is used on starships in the Star Trek fictional universe that have the ability to land and take off from planetary bodies.

When a Blue Alert is called, a number of procedures are performed. Before entering a celestial body's atmosphere, the warp drive is shut down, plasma in the nacelles is vented overboard and structural integrity fields are set on high. Loose articles are secured and the crew is informed to stand by.

Blue Alert is a recent addition to Star Trek. During the Star Trek series in the 1960s, special effects were not available to allow the Enterprise to land. By the time of the Star Trek: Voyager series, special effects had reached the point where the Voyager could occasionally land on a planet and then take off, as well as conduct atmospheric operations without landing. While some technical drawings of the Defiant class starship showed landing gear, the Defiant was never seen landing on a planetary body.

Blue Alert is also seen when the Romulans whom have taken over the U.S.S. Prometheus activate its MVAM (Multi-Vector Assault Mode) "VOY:Message in a Bottle" . Although the procedures are most likely unsimilar to those used when landing and taking off from a planet, the non-threatening nature of the situation is probably why Blue Alert was most appropriate for such a task.

Before that, a Galaxy class saucer section that had detached from the stardrive section could survive a de-orbit burn and land on the surface on the planet if it was disabled while in orbit. This was seen for the first time in the film Star Trek: Generations, when the saucer section of the Enterprise-D crash landed on Veridian III. Prior to the crash landing of the Enterprise-D, some engineers doubted a Galaxy class saucer could survive either the de-orbit burn or crash landing. The crash landing proved that a Galaxy class saucer could survive.