An Escape ship is a ship used in a fugue. An Escape pod is a smaller, individual escape ship. Escape pods are usually seen in science fiction but have been used in real life to escape from supersonic aircraft.

Famous escape ships/pods include:

Non-fiction

• The SR-71 Blackbird, B-58 Hustler, F-111 Aardvark and B-1A bomber all used escape pods because their intended flight regime was either too high or too fast for safe use of conventional ejection seats.

In fiction

• Alien series
  • At the end of the first film, Ripley attempts to kill the Alien by blowing up the Nostromo and escaping in the escape pod Narcissus. The pod, with Ripley and Mr Jones that cat, is recovered some 57 years later, at the start of Aliens.
  • At the beginning of Alien³, the hibernating bodies of Ripley, Hicks and Newt, and Bishop, are automatically ejected to safety in an emergency escape vehicle, when aliens loose aboard the ship cause a fire. The vehicle crashlands on a nearby prison planet, killing Hicks and Newt.

• Star Trek
  • In the pilot of Deep Space Nine, a flashback to the Battle of Wolf 359 depicts Commander Benjamin Sisko and Jake Sisko escaping the doomed USS Saratoga.
  • In Star Trek: First Contact, Captain Picard decides to defeat the Borg that have assimilated the USS Enterprise in orbit of Earth, by self-destructing the ship: the crew escape beforehand by numerous small escape pods. The crew are ordered to land on an (in reality fictional) island in the northwest Pacific.

• Star Wars
  • Near the beginning of A New Hope, the droids R2-D2 and C-3PO escape the Rebel Blockade Runner when it is captured by an Imperial Star Destroyer; Princess Leia directs them to deliver vital strategic information to Obi-Wan Kenobi on Tatooine, where the pod crashes, and the droids are first captured by Jawas and later bought by Luke Skywalker's uncle...

In history

• Lifeboats