The United Nations Interplanetary Corps ship the Hornblower was a starship used secretly by the Weyland-Yutani Corporation to explore Saturn's moon Iapetus, although this was a cover to the real nature of the mission. The true mission of the Hornblower, unknown to the crew, was to find and bring back an alien derelict orbiting Iapetus. The crew descended to the alien derelict and encountered the Xenomorph species hibernating inside, unleashing a chain of events that ended in the destruction of the Hornblower, the alien derelict and the Chinese/Asian Nations Cooperative starship Glorious Sun. At the end, only the Captain and the Science Officer survived. The fate of the Hornblower, the dead crew, the survivors and any other details about the mission were erased by Weyland-Yutani. Every recording of the alien derelict and the Xenomorphs were taken by the UNIC, although Weyland-Yutani bribed it and got all the evidence.

The Hornblower is a fictional starship of the Aliens: Steel Egg novel by John Shirley.