Aircraft Carriers II (Closed to posting)

djkeos said:

And through the English Channel goes another carrier group: Admiral Kuznetsov + 5 on her way to the Med/Tartus.

Click to expand...

Nice video. Thanks for posting.

Good to see the Kuznetsov getting out.

One thing I notice whenever I see pictures or videos of the SU-33s taking off and traping on the Kuznetsov is that the age of the average Russian pilot we see seems relatively old compared to those in the US fleet.

Most US pilots are in their late 20s and early 30s. It seems like almost every Russian pilot I see appears to be in their 40s, (which is now considered young for me, hehehe).

I know it is a very limited pool fo pilots for Russia and their carrier air arm, but you would think that they would be rotating their younger pilots through on such exercises.

Just an observation.

There are more recent videos circulating on the net. So far I've counted four SU-33s (numbers 66, 68, 77 and 86) and three helos (two on deck, one in the air I presume as a planeguard).

Still no sign of the MiG-29Ks.

Escorting ships: Admiral Levchenko (605), Olenegorsky Gornyak (012), tug Nikolay Chiker and tankers Sergey Osipov and Kama.

More vids:

Long version: [video=youtube;xZbfZ3ue3_Y]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZbfZ3ue3_Y[/video]

[video=youtube;LrFqPFAz40o]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrFqPFAz40o#t=18[/video]

Interesting numbers there gents, Kitty Hawk is about 6 times higher than anyone else

Good way to see progress on carriers but counting the cats and traps

Of the 9 Soviet flat tops 5 survived and are now divided over 3 countries. The interesting little titbit is that all those ships that survived are either named after or was considered to be named after a capital of a former Soviet Republic. Those who are not got scrapped.

Kiev is named after the capital of Ukraine, now a theme park in China.

Minsk is named after the capital of Belarus, now a theme park in China.

Admiral Gorshkov use to be called Baku capital of Azerbaijan now serving in the Indian navy as the INS Vikramaditya.

Admiral Kuznetsov was once considered to be named Tbilisi capital of Georgia now serving in the Russian navy.

Varyag was once considered to be named Riga capital of Latvia, now serving in the PLAN as CV-16 Liaoning.

The Novorossiysk named after the town of Novorossiysk. Not the capital of any Soviet republic and got scrapped.

The Leningrad named after the city of Leningrad both formerly and now known as St. Petersburg the capital of Tsarist Russia, but no longer a capital of any republic during Soviet times so it got scrapped.

The Ulyanovsk named after the town that Vladimir Lenin was born, but not the capital of any Soviet republic and got scrapped.

The only exception in this is the Moskva (Moscow) the capital of both Russia and the Soviet Union. Its the only one named after a capital of a Soviet republic that got scrapped.

navyreco said:

FYI, the French Navy celebrated in December 26th its 32.000th "trap". It was an with Hawkeye returning from its patrol for the joint CdeG USS Truman deployment.

The average is 2,335 deck landings per year for CdeG

To be combared with
2,100 deck landings per year for Clemenceau
2,060 deck landings per year for Foch

Would be interesting to know the figure for a Nimitz class, I would guess you can easily add a zero at the end of the above numbers ?

Plus... a French Navy picture from the current deployment: A CH53D Sea Stallion... it brought USS Truman commanding officer onboard CdeG. I didn't know CH53s were routinelly onboard Nimitz class... I thought it was generally Seahawks only. (CH53 being USMC helicopters and all...)

I tried to gather all the pictures so far of this deployment:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Click to expand...

On an average cruise a naval aviator can have anywhere between 100-120 traps. Landings are obviously recorded but most pilots care more about flight hours.

kwaigonegin said:

On an average cruise a naval aviator can have anywhere between 100-120 traps. Landings are obviously recorded but most pilots care more about flight hours.

Click to expand...

kwaigonegin, ought to know.. he worked in Pri-Fly aboard CVN-72.

Oh yes when aviators get their 100th trap aboard ship they can then wear an Centurion patch..



Of course it does not stop at 100. Patches are issued for every 100 traps by a pilot aboard the same ship..for instance.. some salty aviator has had a patch like this..



Never saw that one with 500.. but I have seen pilots with centurion patches from multiple ships.

The patches come in various shapes , sizes and colors. There is no standard

Franklin said:

Of the 9 Soviet flat tops 5 survived and are now divided over 3 countries.

Click to expand...

Well, I would argue that really, only three survived.

1)The Kuznetsov, which has always been in Russian service.

2) The Varyag, now named Liaoning...ditto for its service in the PLAN.

3) The Gorshkov which is now named Vikramaditya in Indian service where it will send many more years than it did in Soviet or Russian service.

Those two that are theme parks have only survived as shells and husks. They are not commissioned vessels. But still, to have three of them continuing to sale the oceans for the next 30-40 years for three separate countries is still pretty impressive.

bd popeye said:

kwaigonegin, ought to know.. he worked in Pri-Fly aboard CVN-72.

Oh yes when aviators get their 100th trap aboard ship they can then wear an Centurion patch..

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Of course it does not stop at 100. Patches are issued for every 100 traps by a pilot aboard the same ship..for instance.. some salty aviator has had a patch like this..

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Never saw that one with 500.. but I have seen pilots with centurion patches from multiple ships.

The patches come in various shapes , sizes and colors. There is no standard

Click to expand...

I heard of a guy that had over 1000! Not sure if they even have a patch for that however I think the reason he had that many was because he was also testing out at Pax River.

kwaigonegin said:

I heard of a guy that had over 1000! Not sure if they even have a patch for that however I think the reason he had that many was because he was also testing out at Pax River.

Click to expand...

Well, I know Captain George C. Watkins recorded over 1,000 landings onto carrier decks. In 1962, he became the first Navy pilot to do so...and eight years later, he was the first to log 10,000 hours behind the controls of Navy aircraft.

He went to flight training school in 1950 after graduating from Annapolis in 1943 and then serving in World War II in the Pacific as a battery turret officer on the battleship Pennsylvania. But when the Navy called for more pilots...he signed up.

He was a fighter pilot in the Korean War and served in numerous other capacities, including test pilot. Later, he was an advisor to the movie, "Tora, Tora, Tora." He passed away in 2005 at age 84.

djkeos said:

...

[video=youtube;LrFqPFAz40o]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrFqPFAz40o#t=18[/video]

Click to expand...

The HMS Defender appears at 01:56 (check UK Military News Thread if you want to hear more