Star Trek Into DarknessDemand for tickets for the upcoming Star Trek release was so high, the current technology couldn't keep up, causing the British Film Institute's dedicated IMAX website to crash under the load. The inundated server probably sounded a lot like the Enterprise crashing into San Francisco Bay. But probably a whole lot more smoke.

The highly anticipated film, recently reinvigorated by the news that its director J.J. Abrams will also guide Episode VII of the Star Wars franchise into theaters, will make its UK debut on May 9, followed by its US IMAX release six days later on May 15th.

Though the site has since rebooted and tickets continue to be sold, it was inundated with a crush of 10x the normal traffic yesterday, something not seen since Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight Rises was released last year and brought down the tickets sales server for several hours.

BFI desperately reached out to the film's fans via its twitter feed offering the following: "Due to overwhelming demand for Star Trek IMAX online booking is currently down. We're doing all we can to rectify. Do bear with us."

BFI Twitter website crash

Even Paramount stepped in to help: "To book @BFI @IMAX tickets for #StarTrek #IntoDarkness call 0330 333 7878, while their online booking is down due to overwhelming demand."

Paramount Twitter feed

Demand is high, and so are expectations. The only thing left to do is wait.

Star Trek Into Darkness synopsis: When the crew of the Enterprise is called back home, they find an unstoppable force of terror from within their own organization has detonated the fleet and everything it stands for, leaving our world in a state of crisis. With a personal score to settle, Captain Kirk leads a manhunt to a war-zone world to capture a one man weapon of mass destruction. As our heroes are propelled into an epic chess game of life and death, love will be challenged, friendships will be torn apart, and sacrifices must be made for the only family Kirk has left: his crew.