USS Franklin (NX-326)
USS Franklin (NX-326) is a fictional starship featured in the film Star Trek Beyond (2016). The ship was commanded by Captain Balthazar Edison and vanished during a mission in the Gagarin Radiation Belt, an incident later taught to future Starfleet officers at Starfleet Academy.
The Franklin is a 22nd-century United Earth starship and is a precursor to the NX series, with the NX-01 Enterprise being the first Starfleet vessel capable of Warp 5, and the Franklin a warp 4 capable ship. The Franklin was built about a century before Captain James T. Kirk's USS Enterprise and is equipped with earlier versions of the later ship's technologies.
Captain Kirk remembers that the Franklin had been declared lost shortly after the creation of the Federation and since the ship is eventually discovered at such a vast distance from Earth, Commander Montgomery Scott theorizes that it arrived on the planet Altamid via a wormhole. A major in the United Earth Military Assault Command Operations (MACO) before being made captain of the Franklin, Edison became disillusioned with the Federation, rejecting its principles of unity and cooperation with former enemies. His disillusionment grew when no rescue mission came, believing that the Federation had deliberately abandoned them.
Like the NX-01 Enterprise, the Franklin uses polarized hull plating instead of deflector shields, as well as pulsed phase cannons and conventional spatial torpedoes instead of the phasers and photon torpedoes of later starships. It also is equipped with 22nd century cargo transporters that were certified for transport of cargo only. Commander Scott is able to modify the transporter system so that the Franklin can then beam lifeforms safely. Initially, Commander Spock and Dr. Leonard McCoy are transported separately to avoid a possible mixing before Scott's further modifications allow mass beaming which is then used to rescue the rest of the stranded Starfleet crew.
The Enterprise crew members quickly patch various systems to repair the Franklin and get her flight-ready and then launch her back into space to battle her former captain and his drones at Starbase Yorktown. During the Battle of Yorktown, the Franklin is used to win the fight against the drones but becomes heavily damaged in doing so and eventually, towards the closing stages of the battle, the ship is beached inside the base whilst crushing the few remaining enemy drone ships at the same time.
The Franklin's dedication plaque lists her as a Starship class vessel. This was the original class of the Enterprise from the pilot of Star Trek, soon rewritten as Constitution class.[1]