I am on the level where the NAVY is trying to open the Precurser Portal. I go to the battleship to sign in, argue with the admiral etc. But when I move my squadron to escort the shuttle, a cut scene starts centered around what should be the shuttle --only the shuttle is not there! I get that scene for about a second and then the game crashes. My theory is this: the shuttle is not "drawing" right. I also think that the ship is being drawn wrong only in the cut-scene. If I look at the ship before the cut-scene (possible by alt-left clicking in radar view) I see a regular "Stone Arrow" cruiser (and the game does not crash). I have tried different screen resolutions, different texture qualities, and moving my ships into a position where I could only see the shuttle and escort (to free up CPU time). Nothing has worked. The game has worked fine up until now, so it cannot be my video card... Could the cut-scene file be corrupt?

This did not happen to me when I played through the mission but it sounds like you have done a good deduction of the problem. I would suggest you back up the save file if possible and try a re-install. That may solve the issue. I hope it helps!