India's interesting-looking carrier

[LowObservable]

Some interesting if not good quality shots here of INS Vikramaditya on sea trials.

ÂÅÄÎÌÎÑÒÈ - ÔÎÒÎ - Âûõîä â ìîðå àâèàíîñöà Vikramaditya (http://www.vedomosti.ru/tech/photogallery/27857/27863#title)

Aside from all the ironmongery all over the island, note the "Alaska highway" to starboard of the island - big enough to take an aircraft? - and the huge radar mast on the starboard side.

Vikramaditya, you'll recall, is the former Baku/Gorshkov, which itself was an evolved version of the Kiev class. The Highway and the radar mast are new.

[orca]

Great pictures, many thanks. Doesn't she look sleak from the flight deck down and horrible from the flight deck up!

Maybe they used a similar arrangement to us and Thales did the hull:), BAEs did the superstructure:hmm:!

[NutLoose]

I wonder if the Indian Government paid a licensing fee for the ski jump deck? I bet the Russians never did as it came out during the coldwar..

[glojo]

Great pictures, many thanks. Doesn't she look sleak from the flight deck down and horrible from the flight deck up!No and yes!! ;)

What a horrible abomination and to me a ski jump just looks so, so wrong. The Russian carrier has the speed of a hump back snail!! If that thing went any faster than it did then it might even make a bow wave! :eek:

I see that the Indian Navy are contracted to buy Russian aircraft and following on from the wise words of Engines, has ANYONE seen any footage of any Russian aircraft taking off from those carriers with anything like a decent payload?

It might be interesting to see what will be done with the old Indian carrier as that ship used to have the conventional cats and traps before we converted her to take the mighty Sea Harrier.

Interesting that Russia wants to convert her carrier to cats and traps, the Chinese have always maintained that this will be the final option they are aiming for regarding aircraft carriers but India appears happy to go down the route it has.

Under the package interstate agreement signed in New Delhi back in January 2004, the hull of the aircraft carrier Admiral Gorshkov was handed over to the Indian side free of charge on the condition that Sevmash shipyard would modernise the ship and that INS Vikramaditya would operate a Russian-made air wing. Since then, Nevskoe Design Bureau, Sevmash and contractors have performed an impressive amount of work. The ship has been equipped with a flight deck and a ski-jump for MiG-29K fighters. When these ugly ships are at flying stations, how much turbulence is generated by that huge ski jump? I am talking about the air directly behind the jump as opposed to the air directly in front :sad: (I know what I mean)

[Herod]

So, they've got a carrier and we haven't. Good to know that they still receive overseas aid from us. :ugh:

[BOAC]

LO - excuse my ignorance on naval aviation matters - 'Alaskan Highway' is an unknown to me. I have found 'Alaskan Taxiway' via Google referring to a narrow strip outboard of the island.

Any chance of a bit of 'origin of the species' for we landlubbers?

[orca]

It is indeed the strip to starboard of the super structure. Sometimes the location for the peculiar scene of aircrew and flight deck crew walking to and from the flight deck in full protective attire, picking their way through people sun bathing. Depends on the ship heirarchy of course!

[BOAC]

Ta - an 'Occifers Walk' - and quite right too. Any idea of the 'history' of the expression?

[Rigga]

So...a low-profile wide-beam high-visability option - with a ramp, then?

Is the tower that high to see over the ramp at the front?

[Not_a_boffin]

The thing to note is the complete lack of safe parking area clear of either landing or take-off areas, That's why STOBAR ships always have low sortie rates, too few spots clear to have cabs parked fuelled and armed.

That Alaskan highway looks too small for any sort of aircraft movement, but that's no surprise - only CVA01 ever looked at using it for a/c movements.

More interesting will be the deck layout for their first indigenous carrier.......

[Navaleye]

Agreed. Its a completely compromised design which has cost them an arm and a leg. Freeboard is very low which does not bode well for flight ops in the Monsoon season. Deck space looks very cramped given that you can have helo ops and fixed wing flying at the same time. The new Italian designed ships will be better. I'm not sure if anyone noticed Art Nalls comments on the safety features of Spain's PdA when he was doing Ski Jump tests off her in the 90s. :eek:

[GreenKnight121]

What a horrible abomination and to me a ski jump just looks so, so wrong. The Russian carrier has the speed of a hump back snail!! If that thing went any faster than it did then it might even make a bow wave! http://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/src:www.pprune.org/get/images/smilies/eek.gif

Except that that carrier has a fully-loaded top speed several knots higher than the new carriers you lot are building! :=

[NutLoose]

Except that that carrier has a fully-loaded top speed several knots higher than the new carriers you lot are building!


How can you say that... :E
We don't even know what we are building... We're on revision 3 plus at the moment and it still isn't together, the revised drawings have probably been printed more times than the Bible, and when it finally does launch we will probably have changed our minds again on the deck configuration, let alone the jet configuration, and that is assuming that by then we haven't cancelled them and gone for something else.......
That new Indian Navy Carrier , may well be faster, but it will have to slow down to allow her sister Carrier, (the one we sell to them) to keep up.

:p

One just wonders if by the time they hit water if there will be sufficient service personnel left in the Navy to man them, as there are a lot of SDSR's between then and now.

[glojo]

Except that that carrier has a fully-loaded top speed several knots higher than the new carriers you lot are building! :=

:D:D:DThe Russian carrier only deploys in company with an ocean going tug. Your average garden snail will out drag it over the 1/4 mile and it has spent more time in dry dock than HMS Victory.

During its last deployment to the Mediterranean (allegedly delivering surface to air systems to Syria) this ship's air wing achieved the grand total of an amazing 100 deck landings!!

The Chinese carrier work-up has gone fairly quiet but I doubt it will fair much better, so apart from the USA the bar is set pretty low regarding carrier capabilities. I have NO VOTES for our own choice but it is a darn sight better than 'India's interesting looking carrier' :bored: Nul points

[Milo Minderbinder]

you don't think the Indian one is being treated as a prototype for the Russian ones upcoming refit?
and is there any crossover in knowledge with the Chinese one? The two have been rebuilt in very much the same time frame

[oldmansquipper]

Development of a Maritime Tajus (Their home made Light Combat Aircraft) has been ongoing for some time...

I shouldn't think this will be able to operate from this carrier..

[glojo]

you don't think the Indian one is being treated as a prototype for the Russian ones upcoming refit?
and is there any crossover in knowledge with the Chinese one? The two have been rebuilt in very much the same time frame Interesting question but the rumour mill has it that the Russians might be ripping out those unreliable boilers and installing gas turbines??

The next major item to be installed is allegedly the 'very popular cats and trap' method of operating real aircraft and again this is not something that is fitted on that 'Interesting Looking carrier'

If this proves to be the case then they might be knocking on the door of the local Chinese Takeaway and ordering a copy of the drawings for the US developed EMALS launch system as gas turbine powered ships will not produce enough puff to operate steam catapults.

Did Russia give India that carrier because it was a hunk of junk and part of that deal was the requirement for India to man it with Russian aircraft?