- "We need to get back out there; do what we came to do."
- ―Elizabeth Weir
The Atlantis expedition is an international contingent of Tau'ri based in the Ancient city-ship of Atlantis in the Pegasus galaxy. The impetus for the expedition's creation was the discovery of an Ancient outpost in Antarctica. Its international origin stems from feelings that a project of such importance (the study of the Ancient outpost in Antarctica, which predates the expedition's founding) could not be the exclusive province of one nation, as well as the fact that according to American and international law, Antarctica is international territory and hence it would be technically illegal for the United States of America to operate any facilities without international participation or at least international knowledge. An international committee, originally called the Atlantis Committee was established, creating the first truly international body for the management of Earth's off world affairs.
History
- "We are about to evacuate this city in the hope that it will lie safe for many years and then, one day, our kind will return. And they have."
- ―Janus
Arrival
When the Atlantis Expedition arrived from Earth through Atlantis' Stargate in 2004, they started to explore the city until Rodney McKay discovered that the city's Zero Point Modules were nearly depleted and that the city's shield would fail, causing a massive flood. After searching Athos for safe refuge due to the inevitable shield failure, the search team eventually brought the Athosians back after a Wraith culling occurred. When the team and refugees returned, Janus's fail-safe mechanism activated and Atlantis rose to the surface just as the shield finally ran out of power and failed. With Atlantis safe from the risk of flooding, the Expedition continued to settle down and set up home for both themselves and the Athosian refugees. (SGA: "Rising")
Tau'ri encounters with the Wraith
- Main article: Tau'ri-Wraith war
Having learned of the existence of Earth as a more densely populated feeding ground, the Wraith sent three Hive ships to attack Atlantis. The Atlantis Expedition was able to send a message to Earth, which sent its newest battlecruiser, the USS Daedalus, to assist them. Together, they managed to destroy the three ships, but the Wraith sent another twelve. Seeing no way of destroying them, the Expedition used a cloak adapted from a Puddle Jumper, and a timed nuclear warhead to make it appear that the city had been destroyed. The Wraith fell for the ruse, causing them to fall into Civil War. The secret of Atlantis is now a top priority for the Expedition members. (SGA: "The Siege, Part 1", "The Siege, Part 2", "The Siege, Part 3")
The second wave bombarding Atlantis from orbit.
In 2006, SG-1 — except for Teal'c — arrived in Atlantis on the Odyssey as a step in their war against the Ori. Samantha Carter and Cameron Mitchell took McKay on a mission to connect a Pegasus Stargate to the Supergate back in the Milky Way, preventing its further use by the Ori. Meanwhile, Daniel Jackson and Vala Mal Doran accessed the Atlantis database in the hope of discovering the location of the Sangraal, a weapon against the Ori designed by Merlin. However, the ascended Lantean Morgan Le Fay, who masqueraded as the database's holographic interface, was stopped by the Others before she could reveal it. (SG1: "The Pegasus Project")
Later in the same year, live Lanteans were discovered in the void between Pegasus and the Milky Way, who subsequently reclaimed the city and forced the expedition out. Shortly afterwords, the Asurans attacked the city, killing the Lanteans and taking Jack O'Neill and Richard Woolsey hostage. John Sheppard, Elizabeth Weir, Rodney McKay, Carson Beckett, Teyla Emmagan, and Ronon Dex launched a daring rescue mission, using the city's shield generators to emit a massive Replicator disruptor wave. The Expedition was then able to reclaim Atlantis, keeping one of the ZPMs installed by the Asurans and sending the other two back to Earth to help with the battle against the Ori. (SGA: "The Return, Part 1", "The Return, Part 2", "Echoes")
The Asuran Conflict
The Atlantis Expedition meet the Asuran Council and it's leader Oberoth
Some time later, after a massive preemptive strike on Asuras by Earth's new battle cruiser, the Apollo, the Asurans launched an attack on Atlantis. They sent a satellite housing a Stargate to Lantea, and after dialling in from Asuras, directed a powerful energy beam at Atlantis. Unable to evacuate by Stargate, and unable to fully dissipate the beam after submerging the city, the Expedition used the stardrive to leave Lantea. The recently discovered geothermal drilling platform, located on the ocean floor gave Atlantis the power boost it needed to lift off, as the expedition only had one ZPM instead of the 3 which the city was designed to use. The shield had to be lowered so that more power could be diverted to the Stardrive for the crucial first few moments of flight. As the shield was being raised after this initial phase however the Asurans beam grazed the side of the main tower, causing serious damage to the main power conduits. Because of this Atlantis dropped out of hyperspace prematurely and far from the new intended homeworld, with the city's single Zero Point Module nearly depleted, having only twenty four hours of energy left. With the aid of a replacement Zero Point Module, stolen in a daring raid on the Asuran homeworld, the city eventually settled on M35-117. (SGA: "First Strike", "Lifeline")
Alliance against the Asurans
- Main article: Battle of Asuras
The allied fleet in battle over Asuras
Knowing that the Atlantis team had re-activated the attack command in the Asurans, the Wraith, Todd, allied himself with them in an attempt to stop the Asurans once and for all as they were a common enemy between the Wraith and the humans of the Tau'ri. After McKay came up with a plan that would destroy the Asurans for good, the humans of Atlantis formed an alliance with the Wraith to forge an attack fleet to hold off the Asuran fleet long enough for the plan to be put into play. In the battle that followed, the Tau'ri, Wraith, and Travelers, worked side-by-side against the Asurans and finally destroyed them with the loss of a single Hive Ship and a single Travelers ship. Afterwords the alliance was ended and the war resumed. (SGA: "Be All My Sins Remember'd")
Clashes with the Wraith
Although the Tau'ri-Wraith war continues, the Tau'ri have made considerable progress despite terrible odds. With the addition of Daedalus-class battle cruisers and Asgard plasma beam weapons, the Tau'ri are slowly gaining the upper hand in terms of technology, but they still lack anywhere near enough ships to actually start a full scale war. Since the alliance against the Asurans, there have only been a few skirmishes (mostly with Michael Kenmore), but the Tau'ri gained a major victory when they destroyed the Wraith cloning facility that had created the army that had overwhelmed the Ancients before the Wraith could clone a new one, and took another Hive ship with it. (SGA: "Spoils of War")
Michael Kenmore is now dead, killed by Teyla Emmagan, but the Wraith are still a major threat that need to be dealt with. (SGA: "The Prodigal")
With the help of Todd, the Expedition has made some headway and even found a way to cause the Wraith to lose their feeding organs with the result of a deadly disease. Todd is the only survivor of that disease. He had also stolen an unknown number of ZPMs (at least six) from Asuras before it was destroyed and has used them to his own ends. Three were used to power the cloning facility and were destroyed when it was destroyed, at least one was used to power a hive ship and two more were given to Atlantis to fully power it. The ZPM used to power the hive ship caused it to become the ZPM powered hive ship and was so powerful that it was nearly invincible and not even two Daedalus class ships could destroy it. This led to the Battle of the ZPM powered Hive Ship where that particular hive ship went after Earth. After a massive battle where Earth lost its weapons platform and Atlantis even fought, the hive ship was destroyed by Atlantis 1 and Major Lorne using a nuke Sheppard managed to sneak aboard. Atlantis was forced to land on Earth in the Pacific Ocean near San Fransisco Bay as a result of being pushed into Earth's atmosphere during the battle and not having enough power to pull out.
The future
As Atlantis was returned to Earth in 2009 to assist in the battle against the ZPM powered Hive Ship, the future of the Atlantis Expedition remains unknown. (SGA: "Enemy at the Gate")
Return to Pegasus
Although the International Oversight Advisory were initially in favor of keeping Atlantis on Earth, Lt. General Jack O'Neill was able to arrange for him to be placed in official command of Atlantis so that he could order it to return to Pegasus after a six-month absence as power began to run out from the strain of keeping the cloak constantly active. Although the Stardrive suffered minor damage that forced them to drop out of hyperspace just on the outskirts of the Pegasus Galaxy, the city retained enough power to land on the more temperate equator of a cold planet on the outskirts of the galaxy, leaving them to cope with colder temperatures but otherwise back where they began. (SGA: "Legacy: Homecoming")
Atlantis Committee
- Main article: List of nations of the Atlantis Committee
At least two dozen countries are confirmed to have at least one member in the expedition. The Atlantis Committee is composed of the representatives of several nations, but the leaders of the committee seem to be the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia and China. However, numerous nations have sent people to Atlantis.
Staff
- Main article: List of Atlantis personnel
- Main article: Atlantis teams
Certain personnel have special duties within the Stargate program, an example of these are the Atlantis teams. When the Atlantis Expedition was formed there has been at least 11 active teams in the Pegasus galaxy. Atlantis personnel varies heavily in nationality, role, and rank. They all have different colors on their uniforms depending on their role. In addition to this, each member has a flag patch that contains the flag of the member's home country. Though the most common uniforms are almost all charcoal black, some members have been seen with all-khaki uniforms. They are also color coded. The colors indicate what specialty the members are part of;
- Red (command)
- Blue (scientist)
- Yellow (medical)
- Black (military)
- Green (technician)
In 2007, these uniforms were replaced with a newer variant, but the colors remained the same. Rodney McKay believed these new uniforms to be more comfortable than the older ones as they didn't bunch up under the arms. (SGA: "This Mortal Coil")
Departments
Many of the scientists on Atlantis are organised into departments, each with their own department head. Rodney McKay was head of the Science and Research Division which most likely meant he was in charge of all of the science departments. Dr Zelenka was also the head of his own department. The various science departments on Atlantis are:
- Physics
- Biology
- Microbiology
- Astrobiology
- Oceanography
- Botany
- Medicine
- Anthropology
(SGA: "Remnants", "Grace Under Pressure", "Suspicion")
Races encountered
- "You have been good friends—to all the people of this galaxy."
- ―Teyla Emmagan
Sine the formation of the Atlantis Expedition the Tau'ri have discovered and made contact to several new races. The most notable one being the Wraith. The Expedition made contact with their Wraith, disturbing their 10,000 year old cycle, almost instantly after settling in the Pegasus Galaxy. Since the Battle of Atlantis, the first Wraith conflict, the Tau'ri and the Wraith have been in war with each other. Another hostile race in the Pegasus Galaxy was the Asurans. The Asurans are a technological life-form originally created by the Ancients as a means of fighting the Wraith. They were ultimately defeated in 2007 by a united fleet of Tau'ri, Wraith and Traveler ships.
In 2008, Daniel and Rodney were captured by an unknown, rogue alien race who wished for them to activate Janus' secret end-game device. The rogue aliens later turned out to be a faction of the Asgard that had broken away a millennium ago. These Asgard seem to not share the values of their Milky Way counterparts. (SGA: "First Contact", "The Lost Tribe")
They've also befriended many human civilizations as well. Making allies of the Athosians and the Travelers, among others.
City Life
The Atlantis Expedition have set up numerous social activities to make residents of the city feel more at home. There is even an orientation committee to help new members get settled in. (SGA: "Remnants") Social Activities include:
- Unofficial Mensa Chapter
- Movie Screenings
- Organised Sports and other physical activities:
- Volleyball (SGA: "Sunday")
- Kickboxing
- Golf
- Chess and Yahtzee Tournaments
- Poker Nights
It is also implied that there is a bar on Atlantis (either officially or unofficially) where members can buy alcoholic beverages such as Beer. (SGA: "Quarantine")