Welcome to Warhammer 40k - Lexicanum! Log in and join the community.

Civil fleets

From Warhammer 40k - Lexicanum
(Redirected from Civil Fleet)
Jump to: navigation, search

The Civil Fleets are one of the three components of the Imperial Fleet.[1]

The civil fleets contain privately-owned interstellar craft operating along routes licensed by the fleet authorities.[1] Although the vast majority of interstellar spacecraft are part of the Merchant Fleets, there are several thousand ships registered to individuals, families or trading cartels. All privately-owned interstellar craft operate along routes licensed to them by the fleet authorities responsible for shipping within that Segmentum. The route licences must be bought and must be renewed after a fixed time, usually a hundred years. This means few privately owned ships like to risk the effects of time dilation on long journeys; a license may run out before the ship has completed its journey.[1]

Civil fleets usually bid for route licences as they come up, the route going to the fleet prepared to pay the most for it. This system enables the Imperium to maintain routes which, for whatever reason, it finds inconvenient to service from its own craft. As well as route voyages, the fleet administation also issues one-off licences for single trips. Many of the smaller fleets manage to survive entirely in a hand-to-mouth fashion reliant on one-off licences.[2]

Exactly who captains a civil ship is entirely up to the owners. In many cases the owner is the captain. With the larger fleets, the owners appoint a captain who is effectively an employee.[2]

See Also

Sources