Foreign A/C carriers

[BrandonJ1780]

I'm looking at AllHands here about Exercise Malabar, a joint deal between the US and India...There's a pic of one of their carriers, INS Viraat, and it's got the ski-slope deck. I haven't checked up on too many foreign navies, but I did see another pic somewhere of a Spanish (?) A/C carrier with the same ski-slope. The Viraat's an ex-British ship, so maybe the Brits just like 'em like that and sold the Spanish theirs too...Anyway, my question is: are we masters of the catapult and everyone else just takes a running jump, or what?

 

[phrogdriver]

Ski-slopes are for small-deck carriers usually employing V/STOL aircraft, like a Harrier. Not too many countries can afford true big decks, like CVNs/CVs.

 

[A4sForever]

...Anyway, my question is: are we masters of the catapult and everyone else just takes a running jump, or what?

Quick and dirty -- potential errors follow:

Are we masters??? Kind of ... not because they CAN'T do it .... it's just too hard, too expensive, and takes generations to get it right. Heavy ships, equipment, aircraft, aircrews, training .... takes generations of sailors and airmen. The ChiComs might try to jump some generational experience ... wish I could be there for the forthcoming S. China Sea Turkey Shoot ...

INS Viraat is the former HMS Hermes .... RN Falkland War flagship .... but the Brits can't figure out how to "Rule Brittania" anymore ($$$$$) ... so they got rid of all their really heavy ships. We actually learned much about OUR CV's from the Brits ... angle deck, hurricane bow, fresnel lens ... just to mention 3 items.

If memory serves ... the last "real" CV in RN service was the Ark Royal ... complete with a bunch of F-4s and Buccaneers (RN A-6's ) amongst her deckload, prior to "conversion" which shrunk the air group by almost 50% ....

The Spanish "carrier" ... with 12 Harriers and 12 helos .... and is actually based upon a US design and took a whole bunch of years to complete. The former Spanish carrier was the USS Cabot ... a light carrier from WW2.

Potential errors ... OUT.

 

[Brett327]

I'm looking at AllHands here about Exercise Malabar, a joint deal between the US and India...There's a pic of one of their carriers, INS Viraat, and it's got the ski-slope deck. I haven't checked up on too many foreign navies, but I did see another pic somewhere of a Spanish (?) A/C carrier with the same ski-slope. The Viraat's an ex-British ship, so maybe the Brits just like 'em like that and sold the Spanish theirs too...Anyway, my question is: are we masters of the catapult and everyone else just takes a running jump, or what?

Actually, the French Charles de Gaul class CVN probably runs the closest to how our carriers operate. Catapults, angled deck, tailhook recoveries, etc. The Russians have fooled around with carrier ops in the past, but never really perfected it. Their Kuznetzov class was as close as they got to an operational CVN, and while it was designed to launch non-VSTOL type aircraft, the Soviets never really did much with it.

Brett

 

[Coota0]

Don't the Argentines have small "Cat and Hook" Carrier, I know I've seen that their Super Etendard crews are carrier qualified.

 

[A4sForever]

Don't the Argentines have small "Cat and Hook" Carrier, I know I've seen that their Super Etendard crews are carrier qualified.

Not any more ... you might be thinking of the Brazilian "Sao Paulo", the former French Navy "Foch" .... ???

For a depiction of the world's aircraft carriers, one link you might want to check follows:

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/carriers.htm

It ain't perfect, but neither are you-all ....

 

[Flash]

The US are definitely the masters when it comes to the conventional aircaft carrier. As pointed out by others on this thread, only France and Brazil have conventional carriers that have catapults and arresting gear.

Brazil's Sao Paulo was formerly the French Foch. The Brazilians also bought a squadrons' worth of upgraded A-4's (they called them AF-1's) http://www.skyhawk.org/2C/Brazil.htm . They actually had to train their Navy guys from scratch, SH-3 and S-2 guys, because the Navy had not had fighters since who knows when? I think they even had to change the law so that the Navy could fly planes, I think only their Air Force could have fighters by law before they changed it. The last I read most of the A-4's were going to be laid up due to a lack of funding.

France is the only other country that has a competent conventional carrier force, though right now it is centered around only 1 carrier. The Rafale is a pretty good fighter and once they get the fighter-attack version they will have quite a punch. Ironically, when they had to test the carrier version of the Rafale they had to use the catapults at NAES Lakenhurst, they are the only land based examples left in the world. They are actually looking at building a 2nd carrier with the Brits, it will be very similar to the Queen Elizabeth class, of which the UK is planning to build two if they keep the funding intact. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_Elizabeth_Class_aircraft_carrier

The Kuznetsov uses a hybrid system for launching and recovering aircraft. It launches aircraft on a ramp but it uses retracktable blocks (that is the only way I can think to describe them) and uses arresting gear to land the aircraft. The last time it took part in fleet ops was Sept 2005, they lost a Flanker during that cruise. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_aircraft_carrier_Kuznetsov

The UK has 3 VSTOL carriers and use them well and often, unlike most of the other countries that have them. One is laid up in reserve until the end of this decade and they use the RAF's Harrier GR.7/9's (very similar to AV-8B's), they retired the last of their Sea Harriers last month http://www.flightglobal.com/Article...ut+UK+Royal+Navy+retires+the+Sea+Harrier.html

Italy and Spain both have VSTOL carriers and a squadron of AV-8B's, Italy is building a second VSTOL carrier soon. Thailand also has a VSTOL carrier, built by Spain, with a squadron of AV-8C's. I talked to a USMC Harrier guy and he said they were pretty scary when they flew them....

And India has the Viraat and a squadron of Sea Harriers. They are buying the former Admiral Gorshkov, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/INS_Vikramaditya being converted to a conventional carrier right now, and a squadron of MiG-29K's (the carrier capable version http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/russia/mig-29k.htm) on order. They have been talking about building a carrier of their own for years and have planned to put their Light Combat Aircraft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_Combat_Aircraft on it, but have yet to get their act together.

Other than that, other countries have some helicopter capable but no fixed wing aircaft to go on them.

I hope that answers your question........

 

[MarineAir]

I read somewhere awhile ago, that the brits were planning on buying one or two of our CVNs when they get retired. Don't recall the source. Does anyone have any info on that?

 

[Flash]

I read somewhere awhile ago, that the brits were planning on buying one or two of our CVNs when they get retired. Don't recall the source. Does anyone have any info on that?

Never heard anything of the sort. Part of the reason that no one has bought any carriers from the US Navy is largely because they are so big and manpower intensive. The Brazilians looked at buying one of the Forrestal class but it would have taken too many sailors to man it. A Nimitz class carrier has a complement of approx 5500. In comparison, the French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle has a complement of 1750 with its air wing and the HMS Invincible has a crew of just over 1000. The Royal Navy only has only 36,320 regular personnel in April 2005, according to Wikipedia, I doubt they would use almost 15% of their manpower on one ship.

Here is a good link to Wikipedia's description of future aircraft carrier development, it looks pretty accurate. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_carrier#Future_aircraft_carriers

 

[A4sForever]

I read somewhere awhile ago, that the brits were planning on buying one or two of our CVNs ....

That will never happen unless they need the reactors to run the lights in Buckingham Palace ....

 

[Steve Wilkins]

I read somewhere awhile ago, that the brits were planning on buying one or two of our CVNs when they get retired.

No.

 

[AllAmerican75]

Excuse the minor threadjack, but is the U.S. the only supplier of a/c carrier catapults? I remember reading somewhere, probably one of my many tomes about naval aviation, that all the countries that use catapults on their carriers buy theirs and the required parts from U.S. companies. For example, it noted that when the French built the Charles de Gualle, they bought their catapults from us and then we had technicians accompany them out to France to help them install them and teach them how to maintain them, etc. Is there any truth to this?

 

[HeyJoe]

Argentine Carrier saga

Don't the Argentines have small "Cat and Hook" Carrier, I know I've seen that their Super Etendard crews are carrier qualified.

The Veinticinco De Mayo (25 de Mayo or 25th of May) was withdrawn from service and laid up in 1993 when plans to refit her for continued service never came through. She subsequently left Argentina in Dec 98 to be scraped in India. Brazil obtained some of the equipment from the 25 de Mayo for her "sister" ship 'Minas Generias' (formerly HMS Vengeance) that operated former Kuwaiti A-4 Skyhawks. 26 de Mayo operated Skyhawks and Super Etendards. She came very close to launching an A-4 strike against the British during the Falklands conflict but could not get sufficient WoD and retired to safe harbor due to torpedo threat after their crusier (Gen Belgrano) was sunk by a Brit sub. The Super Etendards were still breand new and not ready for carrier ops so they operated from shore instead and were joined by the Navy Skyhawks (note: Air Force also operated Skyhawks as well). A4s would be in hog heaven!

 

[XeroCool]

I actually heard, and bear with me for this could be incorrect, that the russians toyed with catapults system for a while and actually got somewhere with it. Unfortunately, the Russians could never figure out how we stopped the....shuttle at the end of the deck. They couldnt figure it out and it would continue and rip itself out of the carrier itself....and i dont think it was intended to do so.

~X

 

[Flash]

Excuse the minor threadjack, but is the U.S. the only supplier of a/c carrier catapults? I remember reading somewhere, probably one of my many tomes about naval aviation, that all the countries that use catapults on their carriers buy theirs and the required parts from U.S. companies. For example, it noted that when the French built the Charles de Gualle, they bought their catapults from us and then we had technicians accompany them out to France to help them install them and teach them how to maintain them, etc. Is there any truth to this?

According to GlobalSecurity.org the French use American catapults "the forward launch area are each equipped with a USN Type C13 catapult rated to handle aircraft up to 22 tonnes and capable of launching one aircraft per minute". I do remember reading an article about the US Navy exchange officers on the Charles de Gualle and one was a catapult officer who was teaching the French how to use them (another flew Dauphin helicopters).