Weapons

The US Navy is finally getting around to installing a magnetic launch system on their carriers. The system is similar to a railgun. Reversing magnetic polarity with powerful magnets can supply far more power than a steam catapult. These systems are so powerful that they were studied as launch systems for sending vehicles in space from the moon's surface. They are going to be mounted on the new Ford Class carriers. The Ford Class carriers are the next generation of super aircraft carriers that the US is going to field. The contract went to Northrop Grumman shipbuilding. The current class of super carrier is the Nimitz class. The first of the new carriers will be the Gerald R. Ford, hence the name Ford Class.

USS Gerald R. Ford
Photo Source: US Navy

This super ship will be 1,092 feet long, displace 101,600 metric tons and have a beam of 134 feet. It will carry two nuclear reactors for propulsion. When the speed is given as 34 mph, don't let this figure fool you. I am sure it is capable of far more speed than we are told, after all the navy is not going to tell you everything about this ship. It is said that it will employ 4,660 people and be well armed. Some of the munitions will be surface to air missiles with other systems for close in fighting. It will probably carry some sort of Phalanx System. These are the systems that put out many thousands of rounds a minute to present a wall of bullets to an oncoming missile. How it will be protected from those new rocket powered torpedoes is anyone's guess.

The flight deck will be quite large as the aviation portion of it will be 1,092 feet by 256 feet. While large, it probably looks like a postage stamp from the sky. Imagine having to land on something like this in a heavy sea. That is why US Navy pilots are among the best pilots in the world. The exact number of planes it will hold is a secret, but the navy has said the number will be more than 75. The design is similar to the Nimitz Class carriers so the complement of planes will probably be about the same, which is 85.

Nimitz Class Carrier
Photo Source: US Navy

Some of the differences between the Ford Class carriers and the Nimitz Class will be that the Ford Class will be a lot stealthier. This will reduce its radar image. One has to wonder how small you can make a giant carrier look? Could it be that the US has figured out how to intercept radar waves and return those of a much small craft as a diversion? That would be quite a trick, wouldn't it? The reactors are of a new design and not much is known about them. You can bet that they are far more powerful that the prior ones. The electronic catapults will make launching planes easier and the ship will contain new types of arresting gear. The newest planes should be able to be launched by this ship.

The building of the ship started in 2007 and is scheduled to finish in 2015. There is only one shipyard in the US that can build a nuclear carrier and that is the Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding in Newport News, Virginia. Five billion dollars was spent on research and the ship itself will cost at least another nine billion dollars. Even in these hard times, three of these carriers have been authorized. They will operate in conjunction with the Nimitz class carriers, the last one of which will be decommissioned in 2058. The Secretary of Defense has announced that the carrier building program will shift to a new carrier every five years.

A Nimitz Class carrier has a complement of 3,200 that run the ship and an air wing complement of 2,500. The Ford Class carrier will be able to operate with over 1,040 less crew. The Ford Class carrier is about 300 tons heavier than the Nimitz Class. The Nimitz Class carrier is also about 23 feet longer overall. I would have thought that the Ford Class carrier would have been longer than the Nimitz Class. As expected both classes are listed as having the same speed. Not all Nimitz Class ships were built the same way. The first three were built different from the rest, but have been refitted. The Nimitz Class ships have a beam one foot wider than the Ford Class.

The Nimitz cost about 3.4 billion dollars. These ships can go about 20 years without refueling. Imagine what a sailor in World War II would have thought if you told them that this was possible? They would have thought that you were nuts, as those ships ran on diesel fuel and used it up quite quickly. The serviceable life of a nuclear carrier is estimated by the US Navy to be 50+ years. While we don't know the exact armament of the new Ford Class carrier and this could also be because by the time it is finished there will be new weapons out there, we know some of the weapons of the Nimitz Class carriers.

USS George H. W. Bush
Photo Source: US Navy

Some of the armaments are, NATO RIM-7 Sea Sparrow launchers, 20 mm Phalanx CIWS mounts. RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missile Systems. There is probably much that we don't know about the rest of the armaments that these ships carry. An example is that they most likely have Tomahawk missiles on board, a form of Navy Cruise Missile. The newest Nimitz Class carrier is the USS George H. W. Bush which was launched on October 9, 2006.