The United States of Eurasia (USE) had designed colony ships prior to the war on Earth in the mid 2100's. The plans had been designed and prototypes had been built and tested in virtual reality. Construction had begun on the first ship, but it was never finished due to the war. By the time Riker and Homer arrived at Sol in 2157, the plans for the colony ships were ready to be uploaded to an auto-factory in orbit. Riker initially agreed to build two colony ships. Each colony ship could carry 10,000 humans in hibernation pods, so the first two ships were large enough to carry all the USE survivors off-planet. Eventually, nearly one hundred colony ships would be built before construction was halted due to the Battle for Sol.
Exodus 1 and 2[]
The first two colony ships, named Exodus 1 and Exodus 2, were completed in October 2170. They took a shakedown cruise to Jupiter and back to test their spaceworthiness, in addition to undergoing thorough inspection. In April 2171, the colonists were ferried from the ground to the ships in 10 shuttles that held 500 people per trip, "packed in like sardines." Once on board, each person was placed in a stasis pod the size of a coffin, sedated and then put into suspended animation. A sample of seeds from the Svalbard Seed Vault was loaded into each ship. Exodus 1 and 2 were manned by Bert and Ernie. Together, they departed Earth for Omicron2 Eridani , escorted by Howard. The trip to Vulcan took 18 years.
Exodus 3[]
The third colony ship was completed in 2171, nearly at the same time as the first two ships. It carried the FAITH and Spitsbergen groups from Earth to Omicron2 Eridani, where they would settle on Romulus.
Exodus 4 and 5[]
The fourth and colony ships launched in early 2173 for Omicron2 Eridani. They carried the 300 people from the FAITH enclave that couldn't fit onto Exodus 3, along with survivors from enclaves in the higher latitudes, whose survival was becoming more perilous.