Naval News: New Technologies Improve Ford-class Carrier Sortie Rate
Improved design layouts and advanced technologies onboard the US Navy’s (USN’s) new Ford-class aircraft carriers are enabling enhanced aircraft operations onboard and a higher sortie generation rate, a USN officer onboard first-in-class USS Gerald R. Ford confirmed.
New design approaches including installing three aircraft elevators (rather than the four onboard the predecessor Nimitz-class carriers), moving the ship’s island further aft, and having the refuelling station built into the flight deck, alongside introducing new technology for example with the advanced weapons elevators (AWEs), means aircraft onboard can be re-fuelled, re-loaded, re-located, and re-launched more effectively, Commander Richard Rosenbusch, Ford’s Assistant Air Officer, told an onboard media briefing while the carrier visited Portsmouth, UK during its maiden operational deployment.
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WNU Editor: The USS Gerald Ford's maiden deployment has come to an end.
That wraps up Ford’s maiden deployment ⚓️ #WeAreWarship78 #IntegrityAtTheHelm pic.twitter.com/l1OMRmQRJJ
— USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) (@Warship_78) November 30, 2022