flotilla

noun

1. A small fleet of warships (usually of the same class), or a fleet of small ships.

   “Toward the horizon a flotilla of fishing-boats showed immutable, pink-lacquered by the evening sun.”

2. (broadly)A small group of things or people

   “After a few moments Chloe saw Rosamund walking towards them with a small flotilla of shopping bags.”

   “flotilla of tiny ducklings”

3. A spaceship made of one or more central mutually stabilizing overweight spaceships flanked by lightweight, middleweight, or heavyweight spaceships that prevent the formation of destructive eggs.

   “For rule R(2222) a flotilla of six gliders traveling eastwards is generated.”

   “Now, the smallest known Life spaceship that isn’t a glider, a *WSS, or a flotilla of *WSSs is the loafer, which has population 20 in a 9 by 9 bounding box.”

   “The resulting spaceship (shown below) has a phase with only 24 cells, making it in this respect the smallest known spaceship other than the standard spaceships and some trivial two-spaceship flotillas derived from them.”