Vessel prefixes
NV — Navigation Vessel
The most common prefix in the record, and a CIVILIAN one: carried by navigation and survey hulls on the ISNA registry rather than flagged to the fleet — T-class traverse vessels and the later Mercer-class survey ships among them. Its scope is broad, covering both the civilian Open Reach Survey and commercial hulls. Stated in the published back matter of The Drift. It does not stand for Naval Vessel; no warship flies it.
Table
Vessel prefixes
Stands for
Navigation Vessel
Operator
ISNA-registered
Canon status
Confirmed
About the vessel prefixes
A hull's prefix says who flags it, not what it does — the same class of ship can carry different prefixes depending on which body registered it. The institutional prefixes come first, then the civilian conventions of the later era, then the hulls that answer to nobody.