So im watching a tos episode and the away team can’t contact the ship and the ship is drawn away from the planet. Now I recall this as sorta a common plot device in star trek. communication is not always blocked but basically the ship has to leave the away team on a plane to deal with something. Here is the thing. Why don’t they ever launch a shuttle to stay at the planet. I mean maybe more than one. This is especially true come tng where the shuttles I think tend to have transporters. I mean feels like a no brainer to me.
They make it out to be like airline travel. It happens but considering the trillions of transports that go fine every day type of thing its barely a blip. Now granted though in tos their primary mission is to go to where no one has gone before I could see your point. You would assume a bit higher caution than going to a colony well within the federations borders.