Thank you very much for that clarification. Now Nuyota Uhura is only 62 and I could make my character 29. She would have had him at age 33. That would have given her plenty of time to serve aboard the Enterprise and have children later on in life.

Thanks a lot!! :)

A head of any department, given the position title of "Chief" is authorized to be a Lieutenant Commander (O4). You can place someone two grades below in a position if you have a deficiency of personnel and promote into the proper grade. Therefore, you could have a Lieutenant Junior Grade (O2) serving as a Chief of some department and then promote the officer to Lieutenant (O3) after they have completed some pre-specified time in grade requirement. This assumes you have no Lieutenants or Lieutenant Commanders available. Then promote the officer to Lieutenant Commander after another predesignated time in grade requirement. The only Commanders (O5) aboard ship should be the First Officer and maybe the Chief Medical Officer. The Second Officer, who is undoubtedly serving in some other capacity at Tactical, Security or Engineering would also be a Lieutenant Commander (O4). Pardon me, I lived this chit too long. I spent 21 years in the US Army, have been reading Military History for over 40 years and a fan of Star Trek much longer.