WEBF... "The sky is falling" scare-tactic headlines and grandstanding by officers who should know better aside, the reality is that the RN has the situation well in hand.


The reality is that there are currently RN personnel assigned to the various flight deck divisions on some USN carriers, others attending the LSO (Landing Signals Officer) school in the US, and the USN is working with the RN (currently in the early stages) to establish a full training program for the RN's flight deck crewmen.

By the time PoW is ready to land her first aircraft (F-35C, T-45C, or whatever) there will be a fully trained flight deck crew of RN sailors aboard... most of whom will have spent at least a little time aboard a USN CVN flight deck, working beside the American flight deck crew.

That sounds really promising GK121, but the reality is that it only takes one small budgetary cut (over here) and that process you describe stops and all that "promise" turns into another, permanent, capability loss.


I'm not fully up to speed on all pages of this thread, but I think the fundamental questions are:

1. Will we ever see either of the carriers in service with the RN?
2. If one or both does go into service will they ever embark any UK owned FJ's (a la F-35B/C)?

And I don't think anybody over here can answer these questions with a definitive "Yes" at this time. We have a long history of our armed services agreeing capability holidays which turn into permanent losses.

All IMO.

Aircraft carrier section ready for loading onto Clyde barge

http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/image...erpatoo624.jpg

An 11,000-tonne section of aircraft carrier has been moved in preparation to leave its Clyde construction yard.

It took about two-and-a-half hours to shift the largest hull section of HMS Queen Elizabeth out of BAE's shipbuilding hall at Govan on Sunday. It will be loaded onto a huge sea-going barge on Tuesday in preparation for its 600-mile journey to the Rosyth dockyard in Fife. When it reaches its destination it will be joined to other carrier sections.

HMS Queen Elizabeth, which will be based in Portsmouth, is one of two aircraft carriers being delivered for the Ministry of Defence (MoD) by BAE Systems, Thales UK and Babcock.

The 11,000-tonne aft section of hull, known as Lower Block 04, stands more than 80m (262ft) long and 40m (131ft) wide. It houses two main engine rooms, a hospital complex, dentist, galley and accommodation including 242 berths.............

Can someone provide details of how big this piece of boat is in the standard media measurements?

How is one supposed to know how big this most albus member of the Elephantidae family is without recourse to measurements in double decker buses or Olympic-sized swimming pools?

I guess 30 ish x DD bus

Open to ridicule

MUCH smaller than Wales.

Based on the well-known and accepted Wiki standard (EN-BUS) for measurement tolerances, it's over 580 double-decker buses........

Now, that begs the question, how far would Evil Knievel have got down the deck before the inevitable trip to hospital?

Interesting, verrrry interesting......

Front Page: Indians Frustrated by Delay in Delivery of Carrier

NEW DELHI — Despite paying more than $1.7 billion more than the contract amount for a used Russian aircraft carrier, India is in a bind: It cannot enforce a penalty for the delay of the much-needed former Admiral Gorshkov, nor can it get out of the deal.

The carrier — renamed Vikramaditya and first scheduled to arrive in 2008, then postponed until this year — will not arrive until the end of 2013, as it is having problems with its boilers and engine.

The admissions came during an Oct. 10 meeting between Indian Defence Minister A.K. Antony and his Russian counterpart, Anatoly Serdyukov. According to Indian Ministry of Defence sources, Antony was unable to convince Serdyukov to enforce a penalty on the carrier delay.

India will be dependent on the Russian carrier until its home-built carriers come online in the 2019-2020 timeframe, said Rahul Gangal, director of Aviotech Defence and Aerospace Advisory.

“There have been other alternatives proposed; however, the Ministry of Defence has chosen to steer clear of those offers [for carriers],” Gangal said. “It would also be interesting to note whether there is an official offer made for the two [British] Royal Navy carriers being built, which are facing budgetary contractions..............

India are contractually bound to buy Russian aircraft for their carriers and those things need arrester wires to land on the deck of a carrier! Our 'state of the art' ships do not come with these options...

I guess the answer would be that he would only need to travel a few decks down to get to the nearest hospital :8:)

We still have a company Called McTaggart Scott which have a modest track record in producing arrestor gear and still advertise them. perhaps if we had gone for these, the cost of fitting EMALS may have been so much cheaper.


MacTaggart Scott | Defence Products

Time scales and politics
 

A week is a long time in politics...

By the time these ships are built HM the Queen may no longer be with us (hopefully not) Scotland could be independent and the bill dumped on Westminster for the divorce so crippling that anything might get the chop.

The decision to axe the Harrier was not in my opinion a good one containing an element of anger and spite caused by the new coalition government getting the true picture of MODs black hole.

Something for which they, the Labour politicians, senior civil servants and Chiefs of Staff etc were never punished for while those left to serve were left to muddle on with little money and unexpected demands like Libya.

The only up side is that in a period of political upheaval akin to the 1930s we may need to keep both ships. Let's not forget Hitler was elected in 1933, we were at war six years later and six years after that Europe in bits and on its way to a cold war that lasted 50 years...

Helpful Stacker
This web site may help in translating into alternate measurements:
So, what's the velocity of a sheep in a vacuum? ? The Register

I failed to find any mention of the ancient British standard of velocity... the airspeed of an unladen European Swallow!

Still find it very strange that the Indian Goverment cannot get out its contract for fear of being sued over the Vikramaditya.
But the builders/refurb co can run so late and so over budget and they cant do anything !
Almost makes you think the MoD wrote the contract lol

From the horse's mouth (well SofS) at CAS's Air Power conference this morning - and on the record - "whenever CVF leaves the territorial waters of the UK it is to have 12 F35 embarked as the default setting." Didn't see that one coming!

But to be fair, by the time the CVF is in a position to leave UK territorial waters and the F35 is in service, there will have been at least 5 different SofS (and perhaps 2 (maybe 3) changes of government....) so plenty of space for back peddling and U turns. After all, the only way you can tell a politician is talking bull is when his lips move.:ok:

I don't disagree Wrath, but given that work on SDSR 2015 has already started such a statement certainly helps shape the battlespace.

Interesting news.

One assumes that SoS made this statement (in the place he did) because he had caught wind of an argument between a group of people who thought the carriers could (or perhaps should) sail with fewer aeroplanes and another group of people thought that they should sail with this amount or more.

I am wracking my grey matter to divine which side of the argument most of those at CAS's conference would ordinarily have supported.;)

A lot of :sad: faces