Why hasn't the US thought of building an megacarrier above 250,000 tons ？

Yes, we all know that the US Navy has many 100,000 ton aircraft carriers, but what i have been wondering is why haven't they thought of building and using in service, a “megacarrier ” that weighs up to 250,000 tons, and capable of carrying up to 250 aircraft ？It would also have space for VLS launchers for SAMs and Tomahawks. Such a carrier can launch so many fighters than almost all opposing air forces in the world, and can dominate the skies easily operating within a carrier battle group. The propulsion system will be nuclear, but with its lumbering size, even with a max speed below 23 knots is good enough, since the design sacrifices mobility and speed for maximum firepower and force projection. So, why hasn't nobody thought of this ？Building something like this should be a million times doable than building a Death Star using current level tech. Waiting for answers from the experts here.

a reply to: RedSparrow47

I am no expert but too many eggs in a basket comes to mind.

a reply to: RedSparrow47

Wait...metal can float now? Wow...amazing!

Seriously though, according to this...
en.m.wikipedia.org...
Only two potential enemies have carriers and they only have one each.

I would think that with 10, we already have a huge advantage and to come out with a megacarrier, while it would be impressive, is not needed. Kind of overkill at this time.

Just thinking, but also having different capabilities spread out among other ships in the the carrier armada is advantageous in that if one megacarrier goes down, all of those capabilities go down.

a reply to: RedSparrow47

Just as long as it's not killing u ur family and friends right? But it would be perfectly ok killing all those strange people over seas. And it's guaranteed to kill thousands of them which is what they're designed to do. Including little kids. Ya we should make lots of them so even more innocent people will be killed. Great idea. Because they clearly are not killing enough of those turbin heads already!

a reply to: RedSparrow47

Historically, AC carriers have been very limited in the number of global ports that they can visit due to their draft (amount of boat under water) restrictions, same with some battleships too - this already has complex logistics associated with port visits vis-a-vis visiting the vessel at anchorage for vessel stores and provisions, personnel changes, choppers, launches, civilian visits etc etc.

It would make more sense to have a floating platform built with dynamic positioning stabilization for propulsion (similar to the Shell PRELUDE project) where it became in effect a floating military base - protected via it's own resources.

The PRELUDE is 500,000T and will in essence be the largest ever floating man-made structure, designed to be permanently moored with the ability to "weather vane" (stem the weather) so as to remain operational in heavy weather conditions.


AC Carriers have hit a sweet spot in size when it comes to the incalculable permutations associated with a suitable strike force versus vessel maneuvering capabilities versus it's ability to withstand the possibility of a force 12 (Hurricane) weather condition.

Hell hath no fury like an ocean scorned!!

a reply to: RedSparrow47

en.wikipedia.org... brits gave it the old college try(at least planned for them)

www.youtube.com...


seemed impractical and ingeneral something that big would get hit first and fast in any engagement

It'd be hugely impractical. The reasons for which are too numerous to list when i'm as tired as I am.

I'll probably return to this thread and address it in detail afterwards

a reply to: RalagaNarHallas

You beat me to it.

That would have been an incredible engineering feat to build that thing...

Habbakuk was too big to suffer because it was essentially a reinforced iceberg....water sawdust slurry...
Ask the navy about trying to shell icebergs into flinders....
They are hard to dissolve with explosives...
Habbakuk would have had its own freezing equipment and could freeze new skin over dents...
It would be so massive that conventional weapons would be very ineffective against it...especially with its squadrons of fighters etc...

a reply to: bandersnatch

makes a hell of a target for napalm,nuke or a bunker buster though,most conventional stuff seems to have likely been useless but anything can be sunk with the right person at the right place,ask the commanders of the Shinano or the archerfish.Shinano was the largest carrier built until the forestall was laid down,and she built on a battleship frame and was taken out by a lowly submarine who evaded her escorts and put four torpedoes into her belly. i THINK its still the largest ship ever sunk by a submarine

a reply to: [post=20613361]RalagaNarHallas[/post The megacarrier would function within a battle group of course, so the Arleigh Burkes provide air defence for it, and the Virginia SSNs provide the surrounding defence against enemy subs. So it would be kinda tough to get near the megacarrier, since its fighters would scramble too, upon first radar tracking of an enemy fighter formation approaching.

a reply to: RalagaNarHallas
Habbakuk was would have been like torpedoing an island and hoping to sink her....
Ice has its own buoyancy....
the huls could be tens of feet thick....
Perhaps a Jdam or two may giver her indigestion but sink her?
mmmmm not so much I don't think....
Besides the intense screen of shipd and planes it would carry as well as ASW helicopters etc...
The battle would be something to see even in cyber space...

a reply to: RedSparrow47
Presumably large carriers would be more expensive than small ones, so more small carriers could be built for the same cost as a smaller number of large ones.
Let's assume, for the sake of argument, two small carriers can be built for the cost of one large one (the exact relation doesn't matter).
Those two smaller carriers have the advantages of
being able to pass through narrower channels
being able to pass through shallower waters
being multiple, so that they can be in more places at a time. Your one large carrier may be doing sterling work in the China seas, but it would be useless for a simultaneous crisis in the Mediterranean.
being multiple, so that other vessels are available if one gets disabled.

It's also worth looking up British naval history with reference to the Dreadnought class of battleships.
The Dreadnought, in the early twentieth century, was a new kind of super-battleship which outclassed eveything else in the water, and instantly made all the other navies of the world obsolete.
The trouble was, it also made the rest of the ships in the Royal Navy obsolete.
As a result, the British lead in the naval arms race was almost wiped out, and reduced in effect to how much faster Britain could build Dreadnoughts than the Germans could build them.

a reply to: RedSparrow47

It is an interesting thought but to my mind both Silysaurus and Gator2001 have stated my first thought's, also Sublimecraft has stated another and far more important problem and other's have gone over it also with many good answer's.

You are talking about the ability to put a mobile airfield with an extensive military force within flight range of potential threat's and the easiest answer is that this is why the US has more than one air craft carrier.

But to go over Sublimecraft's point again the draught (how deep into the water the vessel is) is a major factor, think how many shallow sea's there are in the world, too deep a draught would mean that the vessel would be limited to deep water only which not only limit's it's area's of operation but also limit's a well tried and tested method of avoiding deep sea submarine threat's by moving ship's to area's of relatively shallow water depth and forcing submarines to come closer to the surface making them easier to detect.

Unlike the old war movies you have seen modern submarine's can fire at great depth and no longer use peroscope's (some still have them but there electronic senses are far superior to anyting a man manning a peroscope could detect) so keeping your ship in only deep water put's the ball firmly in the submarines ball park and is a serious disadvantage in time of conflict with any force that is capable of waging submarine warfare.

Shallow draft on such a mega carriar would also mean that a ship of that magnitude would also have to compensate in size by broadening it's beam (width) and extending it's length relative to that draught, this would then be a structural problem to bear in mind and would mean the vessel flexed more over uneven waves and in heavy see's as it passed over the crest's and traugh's of the water meaning increased structural stress and an inherently weaker overall structure.

Also it become's a far larger target and is harder to miss.


All of that said though there are civilian pipe dreams for even larger vessel's that would act as artificial island's and off shore privately owned tax havens with full neutrality operating in international waters like independant mini state's with home's for the rich and famous, marina's, air strip's, mall's and even recreational park's and if any of these ever get built to avoid tax law's which is looked ever less likely as country's begin to tighten up on tax loopholes that make offshore tax haven's desirable then if they did get built think in the million's or tens of million's of ton's as though they would have a small commercial air strip and heliport these thing's would be not so much air craft carriers as full floating city's for the mega rich, floating Monaco's if you like.

a reply to: RalagaNarHallas

Phosphorous would have been the real bane of the Habakkuk, good point.

a reply to: RedSparrow47

There are no ports that can handle them, no drydocks big enough to repair them, no cranes big enough to build them....

The first time the Abraham Lincoln went into Pearl Harbor it was the first time a carrier had to fly the Air Wing off as well as offload fuel and weapons, and they could barely get into the harbor even then (she is slightly deeper than the other carriers).

Was never supposed to go into port....was designed to provide a portable island for counter Japanese air operations ofn a large scale...
Of course the design has limitations...(straits of Ormuz come to mind....)
The thing would be big enough to launch long range bombers so it needn't get too close to shallow waters....
Parked in the center of the Med it would be the equal of Malta almost ....or Okinawa...
Im sure not saying it was a perfect idea...
But it would have worked splendidly for what they had in mind...

Ships top speeds are classified, right?

Imagine turning that sized craft? or even stopping it?

a reply to: RedSparrow47

During the WW2 the Japanese battleship Yamato, was built, considered the baddest and biggest ship alive. So when the Americans saw it all forces deployed directly to it, and as a huge target. Well it got sunk first and lowered the moral of the japanese army.

originally posted by: burgerbuddy
Ships top speeds are classified, right?

Imagine turning that sized craft? or even stopping it?