Daedalus

The Daedalus is the first 304 produced by the United States, and the second generation of interstellar capital ship developed by the United States military and its allies. Commanded by Colonel Steven Caldwell, her standard mission has been to ferry equipment and personnel between Earth and Atlantis, assisting the expedition team there as needed.

The Daedalus is armed with rail guns, Mark-8 tactical warheads, Asgard plasma beam weapons, and a bay of F-302 fighters. It also possesses Asgard shielding and beaming technology; unlike its predecessor the Prometheus, this equipment was installed during the ship's production rather than added after the fact. (Also unlike the Prometheus, the Daedalus was not equipped with Asgard weaponry.) To assure that their technologies were not abused, the Asgard provided an engineering expert to monitor the ship's systems; for the first two years of its operation, that role was filled by the Asgard Hermiod. Propulsion consists of standard thrusters as well as an Asgard hyperdrive engine, capable of traveling one way between Earth and Atlantis in 18 days.

Crew

 * Commanding Officer
 * Colonel Steven Caldwell


 * Other notable crew
 * Doctor Lindsey Novak - Engineer
 * Hermiod - Asgard Advisor
 * Captain Dave Kleinman-person on Caldwell's left side.
 * Major Emma Cooper-Navigator (The Siege Pt. 3)
 * Captain Megan Cooper-Navigator (Aurora)
 * Lieutenant Colonel Pat Bishop-Navigator (Allies)
 * Captain Frank Levine ("Adrift")
 * Hawking
 * Hutchison-Daedalus security

The siege
The Daedalus' first mission was to travel to Atlantis, which at the time was facing attack by a trio of Wraith hive ships. Using a zero point module discovered in Egypt, the Daedalus could make the three million light-year journey in less than four days. Upon arrival, the Daedalus used its Asgard transporters to rescue Major John Sheppard, who was piloting a puddle jumper on a suicide mission to destroy one of the hive ships. After they failed to hit the remaining hive ship with any of its missiles, Hermiod reluctantly agreed to use the transporter to deliver a nuclear charge, destroying the one remaining hive ship and routing the assault force.

When the Wraith dispatched twelve more hive ships to attack Atlantis, the Daedalus went to intercept them, destroying two more hive ships before the Wraith managed to employ countermeasures preventing the use of the transporter. After sustaining moderate damage, the Daedalus was forced to withdraw and land at Atlantis. Ultimately, it was decided to fool the Wraith into believing the city was destroyed, evacuating all nonessential base personnel to the Daedalus and using the ship's transporter to detonate a nuclear weapon directly above the city shield, then cloaking the city while it was hidden by the blast. The plan succeeded, and the Wraith withdrew.

After returning to Earth, the Daedalus ferried Doctor Elizabeth Weir, newly promoted Lt. Colonel Sheppard and the rest of Atlantis' command staff back to the city. While en route, it became clear that the ship had been infected by a Wraith computer virus that attempted to kill the crew and deliver the ship to the Wraith, who desired its intergalactic hyperdrive technology. The virus was ultimately erased, but not before the ship's long-range communications and Asgard sensor array had to be destroyed to prevent the virus from using a distress call to broadcast the ship's location to the Wraith.

Duties in Pegasus
During one routine resupply run, Colonel Caldwell diverted the Daedalus to observe Doctor Rodney McKay's experiments with what the doctor had termed the ultimate power source. When that power source created a reaction that ultimately destroyed three-quarters of the solar system, the Daedalus assisted in his and Colonel Sheppard's escape, leaving the area shortly before the explosion.

When Atlantis picked up a signal from the Ancient ship Aurora, the Daedalus carried Sheppard's team to investigate. Encountering a Wraith scout ship, the Daedalus destroyed it without difficulty, then withdrew before a pair of Wraith cruisers arrived; these were destroyed with the remote triggering ofthe Aurora's self-destruct.

The Daedalus was dispatched to destroy a Wraith hive ship on which most of Sheppard's team had been imprisoned along with Lieutenant Ford. Discovering two hive ships instead, Colonel Caldwell chose to engage them nonetheless, unwilling to risk knowledge of Atlantis' survival being spread among the Wraith. During the engagement, Sheppard managed to turn the Wraith ships against each other, destroying them. Finding no survivors, the Daedalus returned to Atlantis.

Some weeks later, the ship was returning to Earth from another resupply mission when it was used to relay a warning to Atlantis that a Trust operative had planted a bomb in the city. Doctor Weir ordered the Daedalus to return to Atlantis to assist in locating the Agent, and assisted in an evacuation of the city before the operative was revealed to be Colonel Caldwell -- actually a Goa'uld.

Following the destruction of the Prometheus, the Daedalus was briefly used in the Milky Way as well. The vessel was sent to Tegalus after contact was lost with the people of that world; there they found evidence that the two rival nations on that world had all but destroyed each other. On one visit to Atlantis, Hermiod eventually felt the need to affect repairs to the ship's hyperdrive that involved traveling in a wide orbit around the solar system.

The Daedalus evacuated several Taranian refugees from their world in advance of a supervolcano eruption, remaining in orbit until the blast and rendering aid to those Colonel Sheppard had managed to rescue using the damaged Ancient warship Orion.

Alliance with the Wraith
Three weeks later, the ship was at Atlantis as a Wraith hive ship arrived, carrying a proposal for an alliance against other factions of rival Wraith. During the ensuing efforts to weaponize Doctor Carson Beckett's retrovirus for use against a Wraith hive ship, the Daedalus observed one attempt by the Wraith to infiltrate another ship, coming to the friendly hive's aid when the attempt failed. During the next attempt, in which the Daedalus was to hide in close proximity to the friendly hive so as to deliver the retrovirus using its Asgard transporters, as the Wraith had provided them a means to break through their countermeasures. This proved to be a trap, with the Daedalus ambushed by two hives and the transporters still ineffectual. After an intense battle, the two hives simply jumped away, leaving the Daedalus behind.

Caldwell took his ship back to Atlantis, where Doctor Weir ordered him to pursue and destroy the Wraith ships at any cost. Aided by the Orion, which destroyed one hive ship, the Daedalus managed to cripple the second, but was disabled itself. As the Asgard transporters were still operational, however, they were able to deliver the retrovirus onto the hive, capturing it. Using the hive ship's hyperdrive, the Daedalus returned to Atlantis where it could be repaired.

Further duties
Again operational, the ship ferried Sheppard's team to Sateda, where the Wraith had taken Ronon Dex and were in the process of hunting him; as Caldwell was unwilling to engage the Wraith directly, the Daedalus departed immediately after releasing Sheppard's team in a puddle jumper. On another trip, the ship ferried Doctor McKay and his sister, Jeanne Miller, to Atlantis as part of efforts to recreate McKay's ultimate power source. The vessel was also dispatched to recover Sheppard's team after the DHD on the world they were visiting was destroyed by sabotage.

While observing the first test of the McKay-Carter Intergalactic Gate Bridge, the Daedalus detected the Ancient warship Tria, and provided transport for the Ancients on board back to Atlantis. Some weeks later, after the Ancients had retaken control of the city and then lost it to the Pegasus Replicators, the ship was dispatched with orders to destroy the city. These orders were countermanded at the last minute by General Jack O'Neill, who had been rescued from the Replicators by a team led by Sheppard and Weir.

Following the return of the Atlantis Expedition to the city, the Daedalus was present during an apparent onslaught by Lantean whale-fish. Caldwell recommended simply shooting them all, but when it was discovered that the animals were simply reacting to an imminent coronal mass ejection by the Lantean star, the ship was equipped with Atlantis' ZPM and sent to deflect the blast using its shield. In so doing, the Daedalus sustained considerable damage and came seconds away from destruction, but the mission succeeded.

The Daedalus also assisted Sheppard's team in halting a war between two nations whom Sheppard and McKay had unwittingly been influencing through a piece of equipment on Atlantis that they had believed to be a game. In order to frighten the two sides out of confrontation, the Daedalus' weapons were used to simulate bomb explosions on the planet's surface.

Asgard upgrades
The Daedalus returned to Atlantis accompanied by the Apollo, the newest ship of the 304 Class. The two launched attacks against Asuran Warships using new Asgard weapons causing them to retreat to Asuras. The Daedalus, the Apollo, seven Wraith Hive Ships and five Travellers ships later launch an attack against Asuras to destroy the Asurans for good. The fleet, led by the Daedalus and the Apollo held off the Asuran fleet long enough for McKay to implement the plan and left when Asuras exploded destroying the Replicators.

At the time of the destruction of the Midway Station the Daedalus was in orbit of Earth. The ship beamed up Ronon and on its trip back to Atlantis dropped by the Midway Station to find it destroyed and the escape Puddle Jumper floating nearby. The Daedalus picked the Puddle Jumper up in one of its 302 Bays and returned to Atlantis with Ronon and the crew of the Puddle Jumper.

After learning the possible location of Teyla the Daedalus was dispatched to investigate. It picked up Sheppard, Ronon, McKay and Major Lorne and his team at a nearby planet and headed to the location given to them. Upon arrival there the two teams were beamed into the base while the Daedalus remained in orbit. Michael showed up in his Wraith Crusier and engaged the Daedalus in battle. The Daedalus' shields held and the cruiser proved to be no match for the powerful warship. After learning from a guard that Teyla was probably on board the cruiser, Sheppard asked Caldwell not to destroy it. Realizing that the crusier had sustained heavy damge the Daedalus went to disable it, firing at its engines as it ran, but it escaped to hyperspace before it could be disabled or destroyed.

Major Campaigns

 * Battle of Atlantis
 * Battle of Asuras

Trivia

 * In Greek mythology, Daedalus was a cunning inventor. He was the most technologically advanced man in the ancient world. It is told that he invented making images and was the first man to fly.


 * In the anime series Macross (adapted in the U.S. as part of Robotech), one of the super carriers attached to the SDF-1 Macross was named the Daedalus. Perhaps not coincidentally, the other carrier was called Prometheus.


 * In the Daedalus only ever fires two asgard beam weapons, from either side of te ships nose.