Five Liberty ships were reverse engineered from technology of classified origin, and were propelled by an experimental photon propulsion drive designed by Dr. Hasslein, following on from the prototype used for the Juno mission to Jupiter. The crew were to "pollinate" the stars if something went wrong and they found themselves stranded. Three months after the crew entered hibernation, the Liberty 1 collided with a ship exactly identical with itself, automatically setting an emergency course for Earth and crash-landing there nine months later (by ship time). Back at ANSA, the X-Comm technology allowed Dr. Hasslein to monitor progress, but communications abruptly stopped en route to Centaurus.