Colonial Battlestar represented the heart of the Colonial defense against the armies of the Cylon Empire. Visual observations of the Galactica from the TV series suggests that the Battlestars served a three prong role in the defense of humanity, opperating as aircraft carrier, battleship and a mobile base of opperations.

Battlestars were originally stated as being approximately 2,000 feet (610 meter) long [size quoted in August 1978, in an issue of Starlog, page 53, in an article written by reporter Richard Meyers, who received the figure from the show's production staff. This size was also stated in the assembly instructions in the Galactica Monogram model kit], but this size is not born out by direct observations from the TV series.

Speculation as to the Battlestar's true size has been hottly debated. Detailed review of visual evidence by from the TV series by Todd Boyce with regards to the sets, props, and models in relation to the production model of the Battlestar Galactica and eachother has disproven the afformentioned figure of 610 meters.

Work by Todd Boyce has proven that the Battlestar is indeed some 1,265 meters or 4,150 feet in length. [See Todd's SCALE chart for details].

According to records and information ascertained from the "Battlestar Galactica" television series and related media, the standard Battlestar type vessel had a crew of 496 personal with 200 warriors (Saga of a Starworld) divided into four companies (alpha - delta - gamma - beta) with one company on duty aboard a given Battlestar at all times. Standard Battlestars carried 75 Starhound class Vipers (The Living Legend) and 12 Landram ground-troop transports and twelve shuttle craft.

Following the destruction of the twelve colonies, the Galactica was forced to dramatically increase the number of crew she carried, as well as the number of fighters she could bring onto the battlefield. Galactica now carries a crew of roughly 1,000 military personnel, 168 of which are Viper fighter pilots. Galactica, in addition to her to original Viper squadrons, Red and Blue, now has two additional Viper squadrons, Silver Spar and Bronze Spar of the Battlestar Pegasus. The additional Viper squadrons joined the Galactica following the apparent destruction of the Battlestar Pegasus (The Living Legend), boosting the Galactica's fighter strength to a hundred-fifty Vipers ("Fire in Space"). Galactica is still armed with her standard weapon system, consisting of 32 known Turbo-Lasers and Fusion Missiles, as stated in the "Battlestar Galactica" television series [See WEAPONS chart for details.].

  1. Main Bridge
  2. Missile Launchers (2)
  3. Ion-Particle engines (2) - Gravimetric drive system
  4. Main sensor array.
  5. Heavy Laser Cannons (2)
  6. Main cargo bays
  7. Main Energizer - reactor core
  8. Fusion reactors - Plasma storage tanks - Mercury storage tanks
  9. Exterior Tylium fuel takes for main energizer, Hydrogen fuel tanks for Ion engines
  10. Primary landing bay - Launch Tubes (16 per. Bay) - Shuttle Launch bay
    • D1: Pilot ready-room, lounge, recreation deck, alert pilot quarters, primary docker's quarters -
    • D2: Viper repair bay, fuel storage, Landram & shuttle storage bays, gunnery stations

In "Battlestar Galactica" fans were lead to believe that a Battlestar, as well as some class of Vipers, could reach the speed of light with normal engines. This is, of course, not possible for a vessel in real-space. Thus we believe that a Battlestar could in fact only reach top speed of 0.2 C in real space. When comments were made about a ship reaching light speed, the statement is beleived to have been in reference to the vessel's thrust, i.e. the exhaust form the ion engines being expelled at speeds near that of light. [See ENGINE chart for details.]

Turbo-Lasers on the Galactica were powerful enough to destroy fighters, asteroids and their combined power was capable of destroying another vessel. Given what was seen in the TV series, the Turbo-Laser turrets on the Galactica probably had a low-end power rating of 60 Gigawatts and a standard power output of roughly 1,000 Gigawatts. With 32 Blaster turrets per Battlestar and two heavy Laser cannons the Galactica would have a total, maximum energy output of about 107,755 Terajoules. [See WEAPONS chart for details.]

Main power aboard Colonial Battlestars was provided by a combination of Tylium energizers and advanced Fusion reactors. Fusion reactors aboard the Columbia class Battlestar had a total potential energy output of 2.7*10^22 joule (27 million Terajoules) and with an average mission duration of 20 years the total average power output of this reactor system would have been 43.8 Terawatts. Tylium energizer provided the Galactica with the bulk of her power however, this system having an energy output of 4.6*10^24 joule (4,642 million Terajoules), or a power output of 7,360 Terawatts. [See POWER PLANT chart for details.]

It has been generally held by fans and even suggested by those who worked on "Battlestar Galactica", that the ship most likely had some type of device that allowed it to travel at the speed of light, possibly through Hyper-Space or Subspace. As this was never stated during the show's run, we searched through all the current data available and believe that the Cylon and Human forces used a type of Hyperspace Jump Corridor to traverse the vast distances between stars, by opening a fissure at a solar scale Lagrange point, where it is possible to open such a portal. [See ENGINES chart for details.]

NOTE: The figures bellow are for standard Battlestars. The figures listed in brackets [ - - - ] are for the Galactica following the destruction of the colonies.


SCALE: Capital
LENGTH: 1,265 meters
TONNAGE: 20,000,000 metric tons
SPEED: 0.2C sub-light
POWER: 1 Tylium energizer [7,360 Terawatts]
2 fusion reactors [43.8 Terawatts]
STANDARD CREW: 496 [1,012]
24 officers [32]
200 warriors - 90 are fighter pilots [240 - 180 are fighter pilots]

272 crew [496 crew - 134 civilian]
PASSENGERS: 510 troops [110]
CARGO CAPACITY: 600,000 metric tons
CONSUMABLE: 18 months [9 months]
HULL/ARMOR: 2.8 to 4 meters
EM-SHIELDS: 20% - 40%
SENSORS: Short/Medium range, sub-light, 200,000 m^3/s
SCANNERS: C at 300,000 kilometers

32 Blaster batteries
2 Turbo-Laser cannons

12 20 megaton Solonite missiles (anti-capital ship)
2 400 megaton solonite bombs (planetary bombardment)

FIGHTERS: 75 Starhound class Vipers [150]
12 Landram surface transports
12 Mk. VI space shuttles


All related indicia of "Battlestar Galactica", is trademark of "MCA Universal Picture Corp.", LP. ©1978-2005. All Rights Reserved.