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Star Trek: Enterprise episode
"Minefield"
The Enterprise crew assess the damage after encountering a mine
Episode no.	29
Prod. code	203
Airdate	October 2, 2002
Writer(s)	John Shiban
Director	James A. Contner
Guest star(s)	Tim Glenn Elizabeth Magness
Year	2152
Stardate	unknown
Episode chronology
Previous	"Carbon Creek"
Next	"Dead Stop"

"Minefield" is the 29^th episode (production #203) of the television series Star Trek: Enterprise.

The Enterprise begins to orbit a seemingly unclaimed planet for observation when it runs into a cloaked mine, heavily damaging the ship and flooding sickbay with injured crew members. Soon, another cloaked mine attaches itself to the hull but doesn't immediately explode. Lt. Reed performs a spacewalk in an EVA suit to try to disarm it, but accidentally activates a magnetic grappling spike that impales his leg before attaching to the ship's hull, thus pinning him to the mine with limited air. Any attempt to cut the spike would set off the mine. The NX-01 then makes first contact with the Romulan Star Empire when two Romulan Warbirds arrive and demand that they leave Romulan territory or else.

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• This episode is often cited as an example of when Enterprise broke the established Star Trek canon. Specifically, this episode shows that the Romulans have had cloaking technology since at least the 22nd Century, despite the fact that in the Original Series episode "Balance of Terror", Spock implies that the Romulans did not have cloaking technology during the Earth-Romulan war 100 years earlier and have seemingly developed one during the time since hostilities ended. Since the entire series of Enterprise, with the exception of These Are The Voyages..., takes place before the Earth-Romulan war there is no definitive explanation as to why the Romulan vessels in "Minefield" are able to cloak. However, since Spock does not specifically state that the Romulans did not have cloaking technology in the 22nd Century, and given the length of time the Earth-Romulan war was supposed to have taken, he could have actually meant that the Romulans have since developed a cloaking device that the Federation can no longer see through, although this explanation is flawed simply because the Enterprise is able to track the Romulan ship. Showrunner Manny Coto stated that had Enterprise continued for another season, he would've introduced the Earth-Romulan war. Had this occurred, an explanation of the Romulan cloaking device may have been forthcoming.
• it is also said in "balance of terror" that the war with the Romulans was fought using "old style nuclear weapons" and there was never an up close visual encounter between the two races. Which makes the very encounter in this episode an incident where they broke canon.

• Minefield article at Memory Alpha, a Star Trek wiki