F-35B Lands On A British Aircraft Carrier For The First Time


Defense One: F-35 Lands on New British Carrier for First Time

The fighter jets are conducting trials with the ship off the U.S. east coast.

ABOARD THE HMS QUEEN ELIZABETH IN THE ATLANTIC OCEAN — The expansive flight deck of the United Kingdom’s newest aircraft carrier is largely empty as it steams along the U.S. coastline on its first deployment.

Two fighter jets, U.S.-made F-35 Joint Strike Fighters, sit waiting to race down the ship’s runway. Unlike American aircraft carriers, which use catapults to launch their warplanes, the Queen Elizabeth has a large ramp — called a ski jump — to help heavy, bomb-laden aircraft leap from the flight deck.

“We’ve come across to the eastern seaboard of the United States to conduct the first developmental test trials with the F-35B,” said Commodore Andrew Betton, commander of the U.K.’s Carrier Strike Group. “It’s the first time, anywhere in the world, that we’ve brought together a fifth-gen fighter with a fifth-gen aircraft carrier. So designed and built from the keel up to support these fifth-gen jets.”

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