England's New Super-Carriers

a reply to: Aliensun

It is a laboured point - do you not think strategists have thought of the problems you have posed?

This is a capable and versatile platform - the aircraft which will be carried on it will be able to do a variety of missions that a simple cruise missile cannot - that said, they will be able to use the British Stormshadow cruise missiles on the F-35's anyway. The ship can also carry a battlegroup of Marines, with Helicopters to move them, or humanitarian aid to those who've been hit by disaster.

As for taking out the carrier - easier said than done. The Royal Navy has the best hunter-killer sub on the market today in it's fleet, not to mention the T45's and the soon to be ordered GCS class frigates. Getting near the carrier to inflict damage is something only the best adversary can even hope to do, which makes your whole point moot. I don't see ISIS, or North Korea or even Iran posing a threat to it and we're not ever likely to be going toe to toe with the Chinese anytime soon.

originally posted by: Aliensun
WWII showed us how aircraft can defeat a navy--that started with Pearl Harbor and then played itself out in the south Pacific. (Forget about relatively rare ship-to-ship navel battles HMS Hood, etc. They won't happen again.)

Not wishing to be pedantic, but "it" started before Pearl Harbor. The British had been slogging in the Mediterranean against land based aircraft for a couple of years, including executing Taranto the model from which Pearl Harbor. The proof of how aircraft could defeat ships was shown. In fact, if anything came out of WW2 was the role of the aircraft carrier played and the importance of the ship. Also, forget the battleships, but WW2 is awash with ship to ship engagements, even if you exclude surface versus submarine.

Regards

originally posted by: Soloprotocol
reply to post by justwokeup

 

A free and independent Scotland wont stand still....

No you are absolutely right. It will be blown backwards and sideways by both the speed and size of England's economic and societal boom, all the while being dragged slowly east towards total subjugation by the EU.

You keep calling Westminster "Westmonster". In about 10 years time, when every single one of your laws is handed down to you by Germans in Brussels, and you have French ships in your waters allowing the Spanish to overfish and deplete your natural stocks whilst denying your fishermen livable wages and work, you'll be begging for Westminster to help you break free. Just like you came begging to Westminster after your cute little empire attempt bankrupted you all those centuries ago - something you lot have always been keen to ignore

Some more images from Rosyth.

A guard on board HMS Illustrious, the older aircraft carrier in the neighboring berth.


A view from the bridge of HMS Illustrious.


The two aircraft carriers side by side.


And again


A close up of the forward island of HMS Queen Elizabeth with an F-35 on the ski jump.


And one from the deck as the airplane is being managed to place.


Meanwhile on the other side of Scotland at Glasgow the HMS Prince of Wales is slowly being assembled.

Some more fantastic pictures of HMS Queen Elizabeth being floated out today:
www.militaryphotos.net.../page6
Will be nice to see sailing with the GRF class in a few years time.
Im sorry but i cant/dont know how to upload pictures, because what i know about computers you could write on a fleas arse.

Here is a video of the carrier:

www.youtube.com...=99
Must admit she don't look 70 odd metres wide

Thanks for the photos of the launching out into the water.


It is a huge undertaking to get a ship or submarine ready to go into the water either when under construction or under repairs.

Obviously all of the below water holes must be plugged back up where they were cut in for access...tested..usually magnetic testing for good welds. X ray testing if on a submarine.

All the sea valves...they need to be closed or open for operational machinery. This means hundreds of valves from big...to small. The status musts be recorded and known on everyone of these valves open to the sea. Often locking/securing devices are put on many of them and this so recorded. The status of these valves are updated and recorded daily.

Lines and other services not needed from shore facilities during launch are removed and plans made to re attach them when the ship is reberthed after being waterborne.

All this must needs be put in the launch plans and for which most of the public never knows or sees.

It is a huge undertaking just to get such an ship moved even that short distance to an outboard way...or pier side.

And I have not even mentioned an obvious need such as installing a gangway once she is berthed or tied up at the pier side location.


At some point more and more of the crews accommodations will be made ready... and the galley prepared and meals cooked. It is a great smell on a ship when you have worked all night on the graveyard shift and smell the breakfast being prepared before you head home. Someone is getting up very very early to get breakfast prepared while others get some more sleep.
When you think of the huge logistical undertaking just to get food and such cooking supplies/stores on board..it is mindboggling. I am talking about food only here...but there are a multitude of other items which have to go on board and be properly stored and kept track of the proper locations where they are stored...down to laundry soap for the washing machines...staples for the offices/paper clips, pens etc etc. A nations whole economy goes into such an undertaking.

Shops and other facilities will be manned and made ready for operations. The machinery checkout and approved for use.


All the time this is being done people are being made ready and qualified on their shops and systems in readiness to go to sea.


Nonetheless it is a huge undertaking ..just to get her ready to go in the water...the short distance to the pier side.


I also noted when she was tied up to the piers ..the some 7 submarines tied up pier side and further out in the river. These appear to be deactivated nuclear boats. Fast attacks and Boomers as well.

Interesting to me in some of the photos ..the neighboring dry docks with narrow keel block set ups in them. This is an obvious set up for a submarine to be docked in them...or just removed from the dry dock. A surface ship will have keel blocks much more widely dispersed to take the weight along the bottom of the hull. A submarine has a narrow round hull and the blocks must match accordingly to support the weight.

Submarines also have a very large weight along a narrow number of keel blocks by design. This means that a dry-dock must needs take and sustain a lot of weight along a narrow corridor of keel blocks. Many dry docks will not sustain the narrow weight along keel blocks of a submarine....particularly a boomer submarine...or missile launching submarine. These boats in particular are quite heavy along a narrow corridor of keel blocks

On a large surface ship the weight is dispersed among a wider spread and number of keel blocks. Not so with a submarine.

This tells me that those dry docks are particularly reinforced on the bottoms for submarine weight.


Will be interesting to know how the sea trials go when she puts to sea.

Thanks again for the photos,

Orangetom

You're most welcome.
Regarding the dry docks i seem to recall that they are built to withstand a nuclear attack as are a lot of the infrastructure in buildings and communications around the uk are.An example all the BT towers can withstand a hit.
I never thought about what has gone into getting her ready to get her floated out as you say a massive massive undertaking.

originally posted by: KROandSOTV
Some more fantastic pictures of HMS Queen Elizabeth being floated out today:
www.militaryphotos.net.../page6
Will be nice to see sailing with the GRF class in a few years time.
Im sorry but i cant/dont know how to upload pictures, because what i know about computers you could write on a fleas arse.

Save the fleas arse ! The pictures on that link are brilliant, great size & resolution.

The carrier looks a lot different in the water to what I expected. The port side sponsons are quite prominent. The ski ramp looks a lot smaller than I thought it would (mainly I think because the ship is so large for a ski ramp arrangement). The ship looks quite futuristic.

Why? I just don't understand WHY you would build two flight decks and put a KNOWN failure, the F-35 on the deck? Seriously, the F-35 is like flash paper, apparently, it burns on contact with the air! and it's just like the F-22, it's software only knows on purpose, KILL THE PILOT! I like the "Typhoon", it's actualy a decent airframe and your probably NOT going to beat it in a gunfight. Looks cool too. F-35? It's junk. Just like the F-111 was when they tried to put that piece of poo on a flight deck! Kind of makes me wonder WHY the US canned the F-14/pheonix missile system. But then again, the taliban kickng our butts in a-stan pretty much convinces me the senior leadership of the US Military is only SLIGHTY less brain dead than His Majesty, Hillary and Gumbercules combined !

a reply to: tencap77

Ironic, you "like the Typhoon" but rail against the F-35...

You seem to be blissfully unaware of the problems the Eurofighter programme went through, how close it came to cancellation on several occasions and the huge budget overruns.... Sound familiar?

The F-35 is the same - once the kinks and bugs have been ironed out, it will be (and in fact already is) a great aircraft.

a reply to: LeBombDiggity

New time lapse of the HMS prince of wales being floated into dry dock 14000 tons.
You can see Queenie being fitted out in the background

www.youtube.com...

Hope it works now

A bit of American carrier news...The USS Saratoga landed in Brownsville, TX for scrapping. I live about 20 miles from there and plan on going to take some pics. The USS Forrestal arrived this February and is already starting to not look like a carrier. lol. Ill try and get pics of it soon.

Also to note, the USS Constellation will arrive in december for scrapping after taking the long way around the bottom of south america.

carriers

a reply to: KROandSOTV

That is a great video, thanks for sharing.
The following photographs must be the same time taken as your video. Just adding them to the thread for the record, although your video is much better I have to say.








I am sorry to hear the fate of USS Saratoga, USS Forrestal & USS Constellation. I know there is a big movement to preserve such warships as museums but the costs are tremendous and I don't think the revenue stream from visitors would be sufficient to make such projects viable. However, sinking warships in shallow coastal waters does seem a clever way to generate tourist dollars from divers and the cost of ship maintenance is, eh, zero lol. Maybe one could be sunk as a visitor attraction, rather than the US government pay the breakers to scrap it ?

a reply to: boomer135

Haha, got to love the contrast - We're all getting giddy over the launch of 1 new carrier, while the Americans are throwing 3 in the bin!!

These carriers are just big ships with almost no serious capabilities. That's due to severe limitations caused mostly by its air wing component and it's lack of alternative possibility of employment.

originally posted by: Choice777
Not to ruins everybody's fun but...
a) how smart is it to put such a large slow object into enemy fire ? |This type of carrier or a Nimitz carrier wuld be a sitting duck for any low flying kamikaze jet flighter. Or about any decent missile. not to mention that armies arund the world are making rail guns and terra watt lasers that could puncture straight into a carrier's fuel tanks and blow the whole ship in one move.
b) 1 carrier ( what's that 1 billion bucks ? ) + 40 jets X 60 mil. (2.4 bil ) ..omg.a very attractive target for a night strike composed of 3-5 kamikaze jets flying 7 m above sea level.

c) for all the flipping welding that goes into it, you'd think they could at least make it flipping submerge at least 20-30 m to give it a bit of stealth in case it needs it.

Thank goodness you are allies with the only country with rail guns and laser beams.

The point of carrying the aircraft is to control, oh , about a 500 mile plus radius. Radars don't care if it dark out.

originally posted by: Flanker86
These carriers are just big ships with almost no serious capabilities.

Er, only if you think that sticking an airfield anywhere in the world is irrelevant.