Catacombs Model GalleryDragon Ship
Catacombs Model GalleryThe dragon ship from Dragon's Domain. We know little about the alien race who built this spaceship, only their fate: eaten by an alien dragon. They had an oxygen atmosphere similar to Earth. It is in scale with the 11" Eagle and the 2.5ft (84cm) Ultra Probe.
The ship also appeared in another spaceship graveyard- in the volcanic crater on Psychon in The Metamorph (the same model, this time with the 44" Eagles).
The dragon ship in 2010. Like most of Johnson's and Bower's designs, the dragon ship was clearly influenced by contemporary NASA plans. The main ship strongly resembles some of the 1960s designs for the "Empire" proposals for a nuclear powered manned missions to Mars and Venus, and conical manned Mars landing craft investigated by NASA and Boeing in 1968-69 (the inspiration of Taybor's ship).
The "Empire" designs, by Ford Aeronautic for NASA, were dominated by huge fuel tanks and a large NERVA nuclear reactor engine. In flight, two hollow telescoping arms would extend from the ship to hold the cylindrical living modules, which would rotate at 3 revolutions per minute to simulate gravity. At the front end was an aerodynamic Earth-reentry vehicle. The Apollo command module was initially considered, but rejected in favour of a lifting body design.
Martin Bower design for the ship
It features four docking arms which must had docked to many of the alien spaceships in the graveyard around the planet Ultra; after their crews had died, orbital stresses must have torn the ships apart.
More detail of the dragon ship. Large storage tanks and a large booster rocket suggest a long range capacity.
The front and rear of the dragon ship.
The dragon ship with a variety of other craft (the Ultra Probe is just seen top right).
The model was in the Space City exhibition and Alton Towers; it was later displayed by Phil Rae at various conventions and the 1993 Wolverhampton exhibition. It was displayed at the TV21 convention in 2010.
After filming, the four docking arms lost some delicate pipework, and were striped with black tape. One of the docking arms has lost the end door (this is the arm that docks to the Ultra Probe, and may have been removed to fix the probe model for filming).
The model has a few small decals (hard to read even in close up), most of which are from the 1974 Airfix 1:24 Hawker Harrier (markings for the GR.1A, No.1 (Fighter) Squadron, Royal Air Force Wittering, England, 1973). These include "Nitrogen" and "Air Purifier" on the front cone, and, on the main tank, "Asbestos- Phenolic Material" (originally for the Harrier's 100 gallon external fuel tank).
The "eye" symbol on the tanks is the squadron marking for RAF Number 1 Fighter Squadron (with a winged number 1 in the centre).
Copyright Martin Willey, thanks to Marcus Lindroos