In the fictional Star Trek universe, all Starfleet vessels are equipped with auto-destruct devices. These devices are placed in the vessel to ensure that neither the ship itself or the technology contained within that ship would fall into the hands of enemy forces.

History

One of the most notable instances of the auto destruct sequence being used is when then Admiral James T. Kirk ordered the computer to destroy the USS Enterprise in order to keep the vessel, and the data contained within her computers, from falling into Klingon hands. After a 60 second countdown, a number of charges detonated. This destroyed the bridge and most of the primary hull. It also caused the Enterprise to fall out of orbit and burn up in the atmosphere of the Genesis Planet.

During the voyages of the Enterprise-D there were two instances during her service that it was felt that the auto-destruct sequence needed to be activated. First, when the Binars stole the Enterprise, the destruct sequence was activated to keep the Binars from holding on to the ship if Captain Picard and Commander Riker were unable to secure the ship. Secondly, when a super being began experimenting on Enterprise crew, Picard and Riker activated the sequence to ensure that death came quickly, and keep the being from killing the crew himself. In both cases, the destruct sequence was aborted before time ran out.

When the Enterprise-E fought the Borg's temporal incursion to the mid 21st century, the destruct sequence was activated to keep the Borg from taking over the ship. Lt. Commander Data stopped the sequence because the time was not yet right for him to neutralize the Borg presence. A few minutes later he was in position to break open the coolant tank, which liquified and killed the Borg Queen.

During the time when the starship Voyager was making her way back to the Alpha Quadrant, there were several instances when the destruct sequence was activated. Once, it was activated to stop a Cardassian weapon from destroying a planet. But when the weapon was destroyed, Captain Janeway was able to stop the sequence. Another time, when Voyager diverged into two seperate starships, the ships found themselves still linked together. When a Vidian ship came upon them, they began attacking and killing the crew of one of the ships. Janeway activated the auto destruct, which completed and destroyed one of the Voyagers. This freed the second Voyager and allowed her to continue on her journey.

The Cardassians had also built an auto-destruct feature into Deep Space Nine. When a rogue computer program took over the station, it eventually activated the auto-destruct device. While the actual destruct sequence couldn't be stopped, Commander Sisko was able to drive the explosive reaction out into the shields, which saved the station.