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Description

Every starfighter needs a base to return to from time to time for refueling and maintenance, and bases were at a premium for the Alliance during the entire civil war. Of course, this didn't stop the rebels from looking into viable options, and one of them was to develop a base which could be packed up and moved at a moment's notice in order to escape the imperial Navy. What they came up with was a mobile „spaceport“ that could be ferried around in one piece by a sizeable spacetug and deployed in any suitable system.

Ironically, the idea itself wasn't even of rebel origin, but from the Empire. E

very imperial star destroyer was equipped with amobile garrison, which could be deployed on an occupied planet in order to seize control and subjugate the locals. The rebels, however, opted for a monolithic system instead of a modular design in order to minimize the time for deployment and evacuation. As a neat side effect, the base they came up with could even serve as a support carrier in a fleet, greatly expanding its applications.

With the Empire's iron grip over any notable shipyard and construction site, the rebels had to resort to items which were abundantly available and hardly unmonitored, which could be assembled in an allied backyard shop or scrapyard where no imperial soldier would likely to set foot in the first place. They used old cargo containers, welded them together, cut a few holes into them, installed atmospheric shields and the hardware necessary to guide a starfighter into the landing bay, and called it a day. As a result, the mobile spaceport was a cheap but effective way to accomodate an entire squadron including the maintenance staff and some salvaged maintenance droids andstation them close to an imperial supply route in order to commence raids on the unsuspecting imperial ships. After the loss of Echo base, these mobile spaceports became even more important, as they helped various rebel cells in order to go dark for a while and hide from the imperial purge long enough for the dust to settle.

The main body of the mobile spaceport was a massive Class-A cargo container. It was equipped with four atmospheric shields, and an additional flight deck was added at half the height of the container to provide enough landing area for up to twelve starfighters. At the center of the container was a sealed-off storage area containing both fuel, ammunition and spare parts for the starfighters to keep them aerospace-worthy. Despite its notable size, however, landing insode the cramped container was a little tricky, especially with a damaged X-Wing. If flight control determined that a conventional landing was too risky, the starfighter could be dragged in via a light tractor beam emitter, although this still proved to be quite nerve-rattling for the ground crew.

When not in their cockpits, the rebel pilots and the ground crew spent their time in the habitat area. Each crew member was accomodated in a small single-bed quarter with a few sparse ammenities. A somewhat roomy lounge, mess and some trainings facilities compensated for the small crew quarters, but normally the crews were anything but enthusiastic when they were shown their new quarters. It also didn't help that the supplies on board nominally only lasted for three to four months, which meant that the spaceport required a supply ship to stay nearby in order to provide more food, water and oxygen (or whatever gas was necessary for the sentient crew member to breathe). Needless to say, this somewhat defeated the whole purpose of the spaceport being deployed and carried around in one piece, but it was the only way to keep the entire structure small enough to be moved around very quickly and slip through the cracks of imperial surveillance.

Flight operations were conducted by the Flight Ops tower – a modified Class-E container – sitting on top of the habitat area. When the spaceport had been deployed or was operating in carrier mode, the tower was raised ten meters to provide a 360 degree view for the flight control team. All team members had their own little quarters inside the tower itself to respond as quickly as possible, only to be seen anywhere else in the station during their free time when they took the elevator down to the recreational area to have a drink or something tastier than a common autochef ration.

In order to actually deploy and transport the spaceport, the rebels also developed a simple hyperspace-cabable spacetug – in fact, both the spaceport and the tug were developed around each other. Made of commonly available spare parts and wrecks scattered all over the galaxy, these bulky ships looked as dangerous to operate as they actually were. With most of their components never intended to be combined in the way they were, these spacetugs required constant maintenance and a good handfull of maintenance droids to make sure the hull didn't springa leak during a burn, which easily happened whenever the spacetug performed a high-acceleration maneuver with a spaceport attached to it. When properly maintained and in an overall good shape, however, the spacetug was a real beast: it could easily move half a dozen Class-A containers stacked in front of each other through both realspace and hyperspace, enough to provide a large rebel fleet with a year worth of supplies. Unfortunately for the rebels, building the tugs proved to be more demanding on their meager shipyard capabilities, and as a result only a few dozen were ever built throughout the entire war. And with the spacetug being designed as the primary way to transport the mobile spaceports, the rebels also ended up with far fewer of them than they initially anticipated. In the end, most mobile spaceports were permanently assigned to their respective tugs, and sometimes they were fixed into place which allowed for installing a few extra support structures to relieve the structural stress on the tug's hull and the spaceport's docking area.

Despite their nature, the mobilespaceport was barely armed. It only had a single double-laser „pop-up“ turret under the airlock hatch in the center of the hangar container, as there simply was no room left for both additional armament and the quarters for the gunners to operate them. In order to migitate this problem, the shield generators aboard were boosted and doubled-up, providing a tough defense against even light turbolaser hits. However, the spaceport's best defense was to simply stay undetected and run away when in imminent danger, preferably guarded by its starfighters until it made its jump into hyperspace. The spacetug, on the other hand, was equipped with two heavy turbolasers to simply blast its way through a blockade if necessary, but it lacked any anti-starfighter weapons and had to rely on the squadron of the spaceport to do the job.

Because of their monolithic nature, the mobile spaceports were best-suited to be deployed in areas where setting up a normal spaceport was nearly impossible, for example in the vacuum of space. Hidden inside natural caves of dead moons or large asteroids to conceal the lights of the hangar decks, they provided shelter and a safe haven for the rebel pilots in the area. It wasn't uncommon for the rebels to pair a mobile spaceport up with a GR-75 or a comparable freighter to provide additional parts and supplies. But since the ships were surrounded by nothing but the void of space, transfering these goods ended up being a chore as it had to be done in repulsorsleds operated by either droids or sentients wearing cumbersome vacuum suits.

Despite these issues, the mobile spaceports (and their associated spacetugs) proved to be vital assets for the Rebel Alliance. Being able to conduct raids in hostile environments where imperial intelligence wouldn't have anticipated them and where searching for them was all but impossible, they help the rebels to keep the pressure on the Empire, slowly eroding its grip on the galaxy until it was finally completely ripped away at the battle of Endor.

------------------------------------------------------------

The X-Wing starfighters I used for this render for demonstration purposes are available on sketchfab, provided by the user Daniel under the Creative Commons - Attribution license:

creativecommons.org/licenses/b…

The model: sketchfab.com/3d-models/star-w…
user page: sketchfab.com/DanielAndersson

Description

Every starfighter needs a base to return to from time to time for refueling and maintenance, and bases were at a premium for the Alliance during the entire civil war. Of course, this didn't stop the rebels from looking into viable options, and one of them was to develop a base which could be packed up and moved at a moment's notice in order to escape the imperial Navy. What they came up with was a mobile „spaceport“ that could be ferried around in one piece by a sizeable spacetug and deployed in any suitable system.

Ironically, the idea itself wasn't even of rebel origin, but from the Empire. E

very imperial star destroyer was equipped with amobile garrison, which could be deployed on an occupied planet in order to seize control and subjugate the locals. The rebels, however, opted for a monolithic system instead of a modular design in order to minimize the time for deployment and evacuation. As a neat side effect, the base they came up with could even serve as a support carrier in a fleet, greatly expanding its applications.

With the Empire's iron grip over any notable shipyard and construction site, the rebels had to resort to items which were abundantly available and hardly unmonitored, which could be assembled in an allied backyard shop or scrapyard where no imperial soldier would likely to set foot in the first place. They used old cargo containers, welded them together, cut a few holes into them, installed atmospheric shields and the hardware necessary to guide a starfighter into the landing bay, and called it a day. As a result, the mobile spaceport was a cheap but effective way to accomodate an entire squadron including the maintenance staff and some salvaged maintenance droids andstation them close to an imperial supply route in order to commence raids on the unsuspecting imperial ships. After the loss of Echo base, these mobile spaceports became even more important, as they helped various rebel cells in order to go dark for a while and hide from the imperial purge long enough for the dust to settle.

The main body of the mobile spaceport was a massive Class-A cargo container. It was equipped with four atmospheric shields, and an additional flight deck was added at half the height of the container to provide enough landing area for up to twelve starfighters. At the center of the container was a sealed-off storage area containing both fuel, ammunition and spare parts for the starfighters to keep them aerospace-worthy. Despite its notable size, however, landing insode the cramped container was a little tricky, especially with a damaged X-Wing. If flight control determined that a conventional landing was too risky, the starfighter could be dragged in via a light tractor beam emitter, although this still proved to be quite nerve-rattling for the ground crew.

When not in their cockpits, the rebel pilots and the ground crew spent their time in the habitat area. Each crew member was accomodated in a small single-bed quarter with a few sparse ammenities. A somewhat roomy lounge, mess and some trainings facilities compensated for the small crew quarters, but normally the crews were anything but enthusiastic when they were shown their new quarters. It also didn't help that the supplies on board nominally only lasted for three to four months, which meant that the spaceport required a supply ship to stay nearby in order to provide more food, water and oxygen (or whatever gas was necessary for the sentient crew member to breathe). Needless to say, this somewhat defeated the whole purpose of the spaceport being deployed and carried around in one piece, but it was the only way to keep the entire structure small enough to be moved around very quickly and slip through the cracks of imperial surveillance.

Flight operations were conducted by the Flight Ops tower – a modified Class-E container – sitting on top of the habitat area. When the spaceport had been deployed or was operating in carrier mode, the tower was raised ten meters to provide a 360 degree view for the flight control team. All team members had their own little quarters inside the tower itself to respond as quickly as possible, only to be seen anywhere else in the station during their free time when they took the elevator down to the recreational area to have a drink or something tastier than a common autochef ration.

In order to actually deploy and transport the spaceport, the rebels also developed a simple hyperspace-cabable spacetug – in fact, both the spaceport and the tug were developed around each other. Made of commonly available spare parts and wrecks scattered all over the galaxy, these bulky ships looked as dangerous to operate as they actually were. With most of their components never intended to be combined in the way they were, these spacetugs required constant maintenance and a good handfull of maintenance droids to make sure the hull didn't springa leak during a burn, which easily happened whenever the spacetug performed a high-acceleration maneuver with a spaceport attached to it. When properly maintained and in an overall good shape, however, the spacetug was a real beast: it could easily move half a dozen Class-A containers stacked in front of each other through both realspace and hyperspace, enough to provide a large rebel fleet with a year worth of supplies. Unfortunately for the rebels, building the tugs proved to be more demanding on their meager shipyard capabilities, and as a result only a few dozen were ever built throughout the entire war. And with the spacetug being designed as the primary way to transport the mobile spaceports, the rebels also ended up with far fewer of them than they initially anticipated. In the end, most mobile spaceports were permanently assigned to their respective tugs, and sometimes they were fixed into place which allowed for installing a few extra support structures to relieve the structural stress on the tug's hull and the spaceport's docking area.

Despite their nature, the mobilespaceport was barely armed. It only had a single double-laser „pop-up“ turret under the airlock hatch in the center of the hangar container, as there simply was no room left for both additional armament and the quarters for the gunners to operate them. In order to migitate this problem, the shield generators aboard were boosted and doubled-up, providing a tough defense against even light turbolaser hits. However, the spaceport's best defense was to simply stay undetected and run away when in imminent danger, preferably guarded by its starfighters until it made its jump into hyperspace. The spacetug, on the other hand, was equipped with two heavy turbolasers to simply blast its way through a blockade if necessary, but it lacked any anti-starfighter weapons and had to rely on the squadron of the spaceport to do the job.

Because of their monolithic nature, the mobile spaceports were best-suited to be deployed in areas where setting up a normal spaceport was nearly impossible, for example in the vacuum of space. Hidden inside natural caves of dead moons or large asteroids to conceal the lights of the hangar decks, they provided shelter and a safe haven for the rebel pilots in the area. It wasn't uncommon for the rebels to pair a mobile spaceport up with a GR-75 or a comparable freighter to provide additional parts and supplies. But since the ships were surrounded by nothing but the void of space, transfering these goods ended up being a chore as it had to be done in repulsorsleds operated by either droids or sentients wearing cumbersome vacuum suits.

Despite these issues, the mobile spaceports (and their associated spacetugs) proved to be vital assets for the Rebel Alliance. Being able to conduct raids in hostile environments where imperial intelligence wouldn't have anticipated them and where searching for them was all but impossible, they help the rebels to keep the pressure on the Empire, slowly eroding its grip on the galaxy until it was finally completely ripped away at the battle of Endor.

------------------------------------------------------------

The X-Wing starfighters I used for this render for demonstration purposes are available on sketchfab, provided by the user Daniel under the Creative Commons - Attribution license:

creativecommons.org/licenses/b…

The model: sketchfab.com/3d-models/star-w…
user page: sketchfab.com/DanielAndersson