Beta Rigel, or, more simply, Rigel, was a single star system in the Alpha Quadrant.
History[]
In 2257, during the first Federation-Klingon War, this star system was occupied by the Klingons. (DIS: "The War Without, The War Within")
Stellar cartography[]
In 2256, the location of Beta Rigel was labeled on the star chart "Alpha/Beta Quadrant Overview" in the ready room aboard the USS Discovery. (DIS: "Magic to Make the Sanest Man Go Mad")
In 2258, the system's location was labeled on a star chart seen on the main viewscreen of the USS Enterprise. (DIS: "Such Sweet Sorrow, Part 2")
In 2259, the location of this system was labeled on a stellar cartography chart that was seen on the USS Enterprise's ready room viewscreen. This system's symbol had a blue color, indicating that it was affiliated with the United Federation of Planets. (SNW: "Strange New Worlds", "Spock Amok")
In 2324, the location of this system was labeled in a chart used during a Section 31 Alpha Team briefing. (Star Trek: Section 31)
The system's location was labeled in a Federation star chart that was in Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy's office at Starfleet Headquarters in 2399 and on the bridge of the USS Titan-A in 2401. The Beta Rigel system was in or near to Federation space. (PIC: "Maps and Legends", "The Next Generation", "Disengage")
In 2401, this system's position was labeled on a star chart used by Captain William T. Riker during his attempt at finding the last known location of the SS Eleos XII. (PIC: "The Next Generation")
In 3190, the location of Rigel was labeled on a star chart used by Commander Paul Stamets for tracking the movement of the Dark Matter Anomaly through the galaxy. (DIS: "The Examples")
Appendices[]
See also[]
Background information[]
This star system was only mentioned in writing.
In the Star Trek: Picard episode "Maps and Legends", the system's name is formatted as "(Beta) Rigel".
The map on which this location appeared was inspired by Star Trek: Star Charts (p. 62) and Stellar Cartography: The Starfleet Reference Library ("Federation Historical Highlights, 2161-2385"). Star Trek: Star Charts was the first to identify this location as a star and its associated star system, explaining on page 59 that it was distinct from the "true" Rigel, by which it meant the real star of that name. On page 52, this Rigel as containing the planets Rigel IV and Rigel X, the Rigel Colony visited by Enterprise on its maiden voyage. As such, the existence of Beta Rigel fixed an issue, as the real Rigel was very remote, given as 773 light years away in the reference work but more recently estimated at around 848 light years, whereas "Broken Bow" was set before "Two Days and Two Nights", which established that Enterprise was about 90 light years from home and as such had traveled as far as any Human has ever traveled from Earth. Furthermore, a situation where there were two Rigels explained how there could be both many populated and popular planets with the name Rigel, some apparently even containing Human populations, and yet also seemingly remote and far from civilization planets such as Rigel VII and Rigel XII.
In the Star Trek: Star Charts (p. 62) and Stellar Cartography: The Starfleet Reference Library ("Federation Historical Highlights, 2161-2385"), the primary of Beta Rigel was classified as an A-class star.
Apocrypha[]
It was written in the ENT novel Tower of Babel by Christopher L. Bennett, that the Beta Rigel system was the home system of the Rigelians, the turtle-like Chelon, and the primitive Kalar.
External link[]
- Beta Rigel at Memory Beta, the wiki for licensed Star Trek works