USS Yamato The USS " Yamato " ( NCC - 1305 - E / NCC - 71807 ) was a 24th century Federation starship operated by Starfleet . She was a sister ship of the . History . In the early 2360s , the USS " Yamato " , along with her sister ship , were being constructed at the Utopia Planitia Fleet Yards . During the construction phase , Design Engineer Leah Brahms supervised the implementation of improved subspace field generator s onto both starships . ( , " okudagram " ) In early 2365 , an unmanned reproduction of the USS " Yamato " was created by the entity known as Nagilum inside a " hole in space " . The reproduction had corridor walls made out of a material similar to tritanium and was created to study the reactions of the " Enterprise " - D crew . The real USS " Yamato " was at the time located in another quadrant of space away from the " hole in space " that appeared en route to the Morgana Quadrant from the Rachelis system . Lieutenant Worf and Commander Riker investigated the reproduction before it was erased by Nagilum . ( ) Later that year , Captain Richard McKenzie was the commanding officer of the " Yamato " . The real USS " Yamato " was assigned to patrol the Neutral Zone in Sector 134 . The " Yamato " was listed on a Starship Deploy Status chart in the courtroom of Starbase 173 . ( , " okudagram " ) In a very short time , the command of the " Yamato " was transferred to Captain Donald Varley . The starship visited the planet Denius III , where an archaeological dig was underway under the supervision of Doctor . The doctor allowed a device of Iconian origin to be carried back to the " Yamato " , where an analysis of the device revealed a historical star chart with the location of Iconia . Captain Varley decided to take immediate preemptive action and took the " Yamato " into the Romulan Neutral Zone to locate Iconia , before it was discovered by the Romulan s . In the Neutral Zone , the " Yamato " played hide and seek through several star system s and successfully eluded a Romulan cruiser tracking them . After arriving at Iconia , the " Yamato " received an Iconian software transmission and was unable to continue the investigation due to random system failures , later on discovered to have been caused by the software . An engineering team of 18 personnel were killed when the force field in a shuttlebay was shut down . The " Yamato " left Iconia to rendezvous with the " Enterprise " - D to solve the malfunctions and convince Captain Jean - Luc Picard to continue with the exploration of Iconia . The " Haakona " under cloak detected the " Yamato " and copied its log transmissions to the " Enterprise " - D , while it was traveling to the rendezvous . After the " Yamato " had arrived closer to the Federation side of the Neutral Zone , a position twelve hours and sixteen minutes away from Iconia at warp 8 , the Iconian software caused an antimatter containment failure . The magnetic seals around the antimatter chamber collapsed , and the computer initiated the emergency release system to dump the " Yamato " s supply of antimatter . However , the program caused the release to halt with antimatter remaining within the ship , resulting in an uncontrolled matter / antimatter mix , creating a warp core breach . While the saucer section was thrown free of the breach , the hull disintegrated , exposing all its decks to space . The " Yamato " was lost with all hands . ( ) Appendices . Background information . The name " Yamato " was pronounced Ya - ma - toe . According to the , the " Yamato " was named for the battleship , which served as flagship of the during World War II . According to technical illustrator and modeler Rick Sternbach , the name was not a reference to the Japanese anime series ( or " Star Blazers " in North America ) , even though he and several other members of the production staff are fans of Japanese animation . Sternbach stated at AnimeCon 1991 that the TNG writers had independently coined the ship ' s name without his input and he doubts that the writers were aware of the anime connection . " " states that during the ship ' s construction , the starboard pylon phaser array was exchanged for one from the " Yamato " s sister ship USS " Enterprise " - D in 2355 for better operational fit . It was also stated that the next ship in the production line after the was the USS " Yamato " . ( Though this was before the episode introduced the , with a lower registry number of NCC - 71099 ) . According to the " Star Trek Encyclopedia " ( 4th ed . , vol . 2 , p . 505 ) , a dedication plaque was made for the USS " Yamato " . Presumably the plaque was made for ; however , it was not seen on screen in the episode . In , the dedication plaque of Nagilum ' s recreation of the " Yamato " was seen , but it was only a reuse of the " Enterprise " - D plaque . In the remaster ed version of the episode , the plaque was blurred in post production to hide the fact . Registry . ↑ The " Yamato " s registry was identified by dialogue in " Where Silence Has Lease " by Riker who visually identified it from the hull of Nagilum ' s reproduction and stated it to be " NCC - 1305 - E " . When the " Yamato " was listed on a Starship Deploy Status in " The Measure Of A Man " , the starship had the registry " NCC - 24383 " . However , with its later appearance in " Contagion " , several computer screens , schematic s and captain ' s log s identified the registry as " NCC - 71807 " . In the exploding saucer section model from " Contagion " the registry was " NCC - 71806 " instead of " NCC - 71807 " . While " NCC - 71806 " and " NCC - 24383 " can be clearly seen in the remastered high - definition versions of the episodes , they are not as prominent as the registries mentioned in dialogue and the computer screen graphics from " Contagion " . According to " Star Trek Encyclopedia " ( 4th ed . , vol . 2 , p . 505 ) , the initial NCC - 1305 - E registry number was a production mistake . It was given to the " Yamato " by the episode writer Jack B . Sowards who was unaware of the registry numbering scheme developed for . Michael Okuda had intended to correct the number , as he had already finished the decals for the saucer section of the model for " Contagion " , but as the scene was removed from an intermediate draft , he dropped the issue , only to find out the scene had been re - added later on to the final draft , which Okuda realized after the episode had aired .