Kyaa-class Search and Rescue Vessel

Designed to fill a perceived gap in the Star Army for a dedicated search and rescue ship, the Kyaa SAR is the first vessel of its type to come out of Ketsurui Fleet Yards. Combining a powerful sensor package and equally powerful engines, the Kyaa can find vessels in distress and deliver its rescue squads and state-of-the-art medical facilities to anywhere they are needed in a minimum of time. While designed primarily around the roles of search and rescue, the Kyaa can be used to various extents in other roles such as scouting, personnel transfer and hostile ship boarding.

Under the Military Buildup Limitations, the Kyaa is not considered a warship (it is a military support ship).

Design for the Kyaa SAR began in early YE 29, and by the end of the same year had progressed to the point where a limited number of pre-production models were released for field-testing.

• Type: Search And Rescue
• Class: Ke-D4/S4-1a Kyaa
• Designers: Ketsurui Fleet Yards
• Manufacturer: Ketsurui Star Fortress (NH-X1-01)
• Production: Currently a limited number of experimental models while undergoing testing.

• Total Crew: 30
  • Starship Command Crew (6): 1 Captain, 1 Executive Officer, 1 Intelligence Officers, 1 Starship Pilot/Navigator, 1 Communications Officer, 1 Sensors Officer.
  • Security Crew (16): 2 Squad Leaders, 14 Power Armour Pilots.
  • Medical and Science Crew (4): 1 Medical Officer, 3 Medical Crew, 1 Science Officer.
  • Support Crew (4): 2 Cooks, 2 Technicians.

Maximum Capacity: There are accommodations for 42 crew and 24 additional persons. About 100 people can fit aboard in an emergency.

• Length: 93 meters
• Width: 41 meters
• Height: 21 meters
• Decks: 4
• Mass: Approx 360,300kg

• Speed (Aerial): Mach 7 in atmosphere (with shields). The ship has landing gear and full VTOL capability.
• Speed (Water): Up to 40 knots underwater. The Kyaa can float on the surface with its anti-gravity systems.
• Range: Limited only by the lifespan of the vessel. Life-support can support the crew for 20 years.
• Lifespan: The vessel is estimated to operate for at least 50 years of constant use.
• Refit Cycle: Frequent minor modifications while in service through the PANTHEON automatic upgrade system.

See Damage Rating (Version 3) for an explanation of the damage system.

• Hull: 10
• Shields: 10 (Threshold 1)

Deck List (from top): Launch Deck (1), Main Deck (2), Medical Deck (3), Cargo Deck (4).

Located on Main Deck to the aft of the planning room, the ship's central armory contains most of the weapons for the crew along with spares and extra ammunition for the security squads (whose weapons are stored in the squad rooms). The armory is in an Zesuaium-armored, cooled, static-free vault. There is an elevator located at the rear of the armory that goes to the Launch Deck above to provide easy rearmament of power armors and for transfers between the armory and squad rooms. There is no nodal system available in the armory, and as a restricted area it can only be accessed by those with permission from the ship's captain. The standard Kyaa SAR armory includes (but is not limited to) the following:

• 40 Type 28 Nekovalkyrja Service Pistols with 120 additional BR-28A battery magazines
• 20 Type 28 Nekovalkyrja Submachine guns with 80 additional BR-SMG battery magazines
• 32 Ke-M4-2901 Light Armor Service Rifles, with 6 additional magazines of ammunition each.
• 16 Ke-M2-2901 Aether Saber Rifles with 64 BR-M20 magazines and attachment cables
• 50 chargers each for BR-28 and BR-SMG
• 7mm ammunition for the Ke-M4-2701 Light Armor Service Rifle
• 60 Star Army Environmental Suit, Type 28 (AMES) (many more are located on the ship)
• Weapon maintenance supplies, cleaning kits, and spare parts
• Explosives, grenades, other weapons, and body armor as needed and/or available

Centrally located on Main Deck, the bridge is the nerve center of the Kyaa SAR. Large viewscreens and holographic projection pits dominate the forward area of the bridge, giving commanders an excellent overview of any situational or detailed information that they need. The captain's station is centrally located towards the aft of the bridge, with stations for the communication and sensor officers fore and to the left and for the intelligence officer and a general purpose station fore and to the right. The four officer stations are slightly raised up from the rest of the bridge, with the captain's station being raised higher than these. A pilot's pit is located forward of the stations cluster and is on the same level as the rest of the bridge.

Port of the bridge and just aft of the midship stairs are the personal quarters of the Kyaa's captain. A spacious room, it is a combined sleeping area and office and contains all the furnishings required to make the captain's duties easier. The CO's quarters also has its own bathroom. The XO's quarters are a mirror image of the CO's, and are located in the same position on the starboard side of the ship.

The lowest of four levels, Cargo Deck is a large open area partitioned into a number of smaller areas in which both ship's supplies and recovered materials can be stored. Accessible from outside via a single large forcefield-contained rectangular opening (covered by armored shutters when not in use) on each side of the ship, and from inside via the lifts located next to the port and starboard docking ports.

Taking up a large area of the aft of Medical Deck, and a smaller area of Main Deck above it, the engineering section is where the majority of the machinery that keeps the ship running and everyone aboard it alive is located.

There are two enlisted quarters on main deck, located rear of the passageway that runs across ship between the forward escape pods and fore of the toilet / shower rooms. Each of these two rooms are capable of housing up to twelve personnel in relative comfort. Six sets of bunks are located against the two sides of the room, with a floor-to-ceiling cupboard at the foot of each bunk. The wall opposite the door is made up of eight sets of various compartments for further clothing and personal items.

The topmost level of the Kyaa SAR is referred to as the 'Launch Deck', as it is from here that the Sylph security squads enter space via the ship's Rapid Launch Bay; the opening of this bay faces forward over the Kyaa's snubby nose. To the rear of the RLB is an area for exiting power armours with a decontamination room (containing showers) on the port side of the ship and a changing room and toilet room on the starboard side. The middle of the rear wall of the RLB opens into a passage that traverses most of the ship's length, ending in a lift that leads down to the armory one deck below.

The largest single open area on the two inhabited decks, 'the lounge' is the primary recreation area for the Kyaa's crew and is located on Medical Deck just fore of the passageway running between the docking ports.

• Kitchen: On the starboard side of 'the lounge' is a well-equipped galley where the ship's cook prepares meals and snacks for the crew and any passengers who happen to be on board.
• Lounge: The port half of 'the lounge' and the room's namesake, the lounge area is a casual area containing large, comfortable seats and couches in clusters each surrounding a low coffee table.
• Mess: The starboard half of the center area of 'the lounge' is filled with tables and chairs where meals prepared in the adjacent kitchen can be eaten.

The largest single-purpose rooms on the ship, the Kyaa's two medbays are located at the fore of Medical Deck where they have quick access to incoming injured via the fore docking port and a lift that goes straight to the launch bay two decks above. Boasting facilities not found on any other ship its size, each medical bay is decked out in the best medical facilities that the Star Army has to offer. The medical bays are accessible via doors leading to the fore docking port, the main longitudinal passageway and the escape pod passageway.

• Containment Cells (4 per): These cells are used for specimen storage and also double as brigs. They contain a removable bed, food dispensing system, and a small toilet. These rooms can clean themselves and sterilize their equipment automatically using a combination of mechanical and nodal processes.
• Examination Rooms (2 per): A separate room just off the main treatment room, the examination rooms are used for patients that have milder ailments or in situations where privacy is required. Furnishings in the room include a single bed, a low row of cabinets against the far wall, a desk with a cushioned rolling chair for the medic and a comfortable legged chair for the patient.
• Elevator: Located near the fore wall of each medbay is a platform elevator (two by two meters) that can rise up to the launch bay (and the squad rooms below this) to carry patients. An armoured shutter blocks the floor opening/medical bay ceiling when he elevator is not in use.
• Hemosynthetic Reconstruction Tubes (4 per): These tubes are filled with fluid based on Nekovalkyrja blood, which analyses and repairs injuries and defects to the occupant's body. They're used when a crewmember has taken major damage. The tubes can also generate new bodies for mental backups to be written to.
• Mental Backup center: A small alcove in the medical bay that contains a bed sitting underneath a special device used to make complete backups of a person's mind (including memories) for storage on the ship's computer. This device can also write from the ship's memory a mental backup into a body.
• Receiving Area: The main area of the medical bay is where patients are initially received, and from which all other areas of the medical bay are accessible. Four containment cells are located along the aft wall, with the mental backup center and the medical bay's two small examination rooms situated along the opposite wall. Each medbay's three operating theaters are along the outboard side of the room and are entered via a pair of large swinging doors that are on three of the walls of each theater (two of these sets of doors (of the six total) lead into the adjoining operating theater, while the rest lead into the medbay). The rest of the room is divided into rooms for storage of medical supplies, the medical bay main office, two sleeping rooms (for medical staff) and a number of rooms for patients under observation.

Located at the aft of the ship, the two support crew quarters are small rooms containing little more than a bunk bed and a storage unit with various compartments for the two occupants clothes and personal belongings.

The Kyaa SAR has four junior officers quarters, which are located two to a side between the CO/XO quarters and the support crew quarters. Much more spacious than the accommodations for the enlisted, these rooms can house up to three personnel each.

Adjoining the aft of the bridge, the planning room is used for planning operations and ship-wide briefing. Also used by crew members as a semi-casual area when they are not required to be on the bridge itself but must remain immediately available. The room's main feature is a large rectangular table in its center upon which relevant materials can be shown (its surface doubles as a viewscreen) or above which holographic projections can be formed. The table is set in a stepped recess to allow onlookers an unimpeded view.

The second biggest rooms on Main Deck (smaller only than the bridge), the Squad Rooms are where the Kyaa SAR's two security squads are based from.

• Briefing Room: Located inboard on the fore wall, the briefing room is where the squad gathers to be briefed on whatever operations they are to undertake. This room contains a large viewscreen on the wall opposite the entrance, a holographic projection pit, an offset dais for the briefing officer and twelve chairs facing the viewscreen.
• Staging Area: The largest section of the squad room, it is an open area in the aft-outboard section of the room where squad members prepare for operations. Racked along the aft wall are the squad's Sylph Light Power Armours, directly opposite on the fore wall are the weapon racks for the corresponding armour. In the middle of the staging area are two poles that lead up through large, circular openings in the ceiling (closed by an armoured, irising shutter when not in use) into the launch bay above. Storage compartments along the outboard wall contain tools and materials for the maintenance and repair of weapons and power armours.

Situated just aft of the medbays on Medical Deck are six rooms which are used to accommodate those rescued during missions. Simple affairs, they contain two bunk beds and a storage unit for clothes and personal effects.

The key substance that makes up the .4-meter-thick hull and frame of the ship is Yamataium. Please note that the Kyaa has no windows.

For stealth concealment, the armor plating is coated with Xiulurium. Xiulurium is a “stealth” armor that lacks protective value and is used to generate a stealth field around the vessel that renders most forms of active sensors ineffective against the starship. This stealth field generated by Xiulurium also masks the vessel's presence to scalar wave and quintessence differentialometer type sensors. Xiulurium is similar to Zanarium in composition, but this alloy is more flexible, requires less energy (to use its stealth), and has only negligible protective value. Xiulurium-S is made to interact efficiently with the repair systems and bond with Zesuaium-S.

Because Zesuaium armor is nearly impossible to repair, the ship's plating is primarily composed of Yamataium-S, a SARA-created artificial metalloid with self-healing molecular bonds. Under the guidance of the HSCS-3, the Yamataium can patch holes as needed in a matter of days. Yamataium-S is also made to interact efficiently with the repair systems and bond with Zesuaium-S.

A highly advanced, virtually impenetrable gluon mesh, first used by KFY in the Kylie power armor. Particles that make up protons (quarks and gluons) the gluons and quarks are strung together in a long chain using an alteration of Yang-Mills Theory. This permanently binds the quarks together so they may never be pulled apart. The resulting cloth like substance is impervious to penetration, although it does nothing to stop kinetic energy. All interior passageways and rooms are surrounded by Yarvex sheeting.

See: KFY Graviton Beam Projector

Located on either side of the starship, along with one on the Kyaa's boxy nose, these attachment systems include full umbilicals and airlock systems. Mission-variable weapons or sensor systems (or shuttles) can be attached to the mounting ports, or the ports can be used for docking with another Kyaa SAR or with a Type 24, Type 26, or Type 28 lift shaft airlock. The custom sealing systems of the Kyaa SAR are self-adjustable so that it can interface with nearly any type of airlock hatch, hull breach or other opening (or area of hull in order to make a new opening) under a certain size.

The ship's exterior is equipped with a single rapid-launch bay, which is a forcefield-contained opening in the hull. The bay make it possible for power armors to leap out into space and into combat at their convenience. The ship contains standby units and extensive facilities for repair, maintenance, and construction of the power armor.

Contains Star Army Standard Starship Emergency Systems.

The Kyaa SAR is equipped with eight Star Army Escape Pod, Type 29s, each capable of holding up to six human-sized people. These pods are located in the following positions: each end of the passageway running between the medical bays and temporary quarters on Medical Deck, each end of the passageway running between the squad rooms and enlisted quarters on Main Deck, the end of each of the passageways between the support quarters and engineering on Main Deck, via a zero-gravity passageway in the roof of the port side of the bridge, via a zero-gravity passageway in the floor of the aft of engineering on Medical Deck.

See: Soul Savior Pod

The Kyaa is equipped with a Combined Field System.

See: Hemosynthetic Conduit System

See: Psionic Signal Controller

The ship has a very thorough recycling system, tied into HSCS-2, which breaks down anything classified into “waste” into its atomic components. The air recycling system (which is segmented and highly monitored for security reasons) can support up to 500 Yamataian or NH-29 personnel up to twenty years. Water can be recycled for twenty years as well.

See: Matter Collection System

See: Nodal System

See: Escort Integrated Electronics System (EIES)

• Projected Energy Beams: See: Combined Field System.

• Ke-M2 "Mindy" Series of Power Armor (16)

This article was created by Itkatsu_Kiyoko. It was approved by Wes on September 26, 2006: Approval Thread