Friendly reminder that 22nd century transporters weren't that great

Still some bugs to work out. And sticks...and a few rocks too.
Image: Memory Alpha.

I think I'll stick with the shuttles, thanks.

For context, this is from an episode of Enterprise called "Strange New World" where the crew explores an Earth-like planet, get caught up in a storm, and go super paranoid and whacked out on each other. This unfortunate crewman, Ethan Novakovich, ends up in such a state that Archer orders him beamed up and well, that happens.

Transporters were still a new technology back in Enterprise's era and evidently the computer couldn't tell the difference between him and the debris swirling around him. The transporters themselves weren't used all that much on the show, if I remember correctly, which I thought was a nice touch to the whole "this is all new to us" vibe that Enterprise was going for.

Oh and Novakovich? He lived, thanks to Scott Bakula.

This character was originally to have died in "Strange New World" and, as such, would have been the first member of the crew to die aboard the NX-class Enterprise. During filming of the episode, Scott Bakula (who played Captain Archer) was concerned that it didn't seem right to kill off Novakovich without dealing with the loss (as originally written, Novakovich's death was not dissimilar to that of the many security guards who died in the original Star Trek series). The producers agreed and revised the episode's script so that Novakovich lived (although the character was never seen again).

 His disappearance can easily be explained as him being shipped off to a hospital for recovery/rehab or being traumatized by his ordeal, he put in for a transfer. Of course, he was a Crewman Second Class, so he could have stayed and faded back in with all of the other low ranked crewmen.