Carrier: A Guided Tour of an Aircraft Carrier

Officially, the Navy calls it a "CV" or "CVN." Sailors on the escorts call it a "bird farm." Submariners wryly call it a target. But naval aviators call it-with something like reverence and religious awe-"the boat." It is the central icon of their naval careers. In addition to being their home and air base, aircraft carriers hold an almost mystical place in the world of naval aviators. As we've already seen, young naval aviators' skills (and future chances of promotion) are judged mainly on their ability to take off and land safely on "the boat." Later, as they gain seniority, they'll strive to command one of the giant supercarriers. Finally, at the sunset of their naval careers, they will be expected to lead the fight to obtain authorization and funding for construction of the new carriers that will serve several future generations of naval aviators.

Why this community obsession about "the boat"? The answers are both simple and complex. In the first chapter, I pointed out some of the reasons why sea-based aviation is a valuable national asset. However, for the Navy there is a practical, institutional answer aimed at preserving naval aviation as a community: "If you build it, they will come!" That is to say, as long as America is committed to building more aircraft carriers, the nation will also continue to design and build new aircraft and weapons to launch from them, and train air crews to man the planes. In other words, the operation of aircraft carriers and the building of new ones represent a commitment by the Navy and the nation to all of the other areas of naval aviation. New carriers mean that the profession has a future, and that young men and women have a rationale for making naval aviation a career. The continued designing and building of new carriers gives the brand-new "nugget" pilot or Naval Flight Officer (NFO), a star to steer for-a goal to justify a twenty-year career of danger, family separation, and sometimes thankless work.

This is fine, as far as it goes. And yet, as we head toward the end of a century in which aircraft carriers have been the dominant naval weapon, it is worth assessing their value for the century ahead. More than a few serious naval analysts have asked whether the kind of carriers being built today have a future, while everyone from Air Force generals to Navy submariners would like the funds spent on carrier construction to be reprogrammed for their pet weapons systems. Two hard facts remain. First, big-deck aircraft carriers are still the most flexible and efficient way to deploy sea-based airpower, and will remain so for the foreseeable future. Second, sea-based airpower gives national leaders unequaled options in a time of international crisis.

With this in mind, let's take a quick tour of the "boats" that America has been building for the past half century. In that way, you'll get an idea not only of the design, development, and building of aircraft carriers, but also of the size, scope, and sophistication of the industrial effort all that takes.

American Supercarriers: A History

The atomic bombs that forced Japan to capitulate in 1945 almost sank the U.S. Navy's force of carriers. With the end of the war, as a cost-saving measure, most U.S. carriers were either scrapped or mothballed. And by 1947, the wartime fleet of over one hundred carriers had shrunk to less than two dozen vessels. Meanwhile, President Harry S Truman had decreed a moratorium on new weapons development, except for nuclear weapons and bombers to carry them. The Navy, desperate for a mission in the atomic age, began to design a carrier and aircraft that could deliver the new weapons.[27] The USS United States (CVA-58-the "A" stood for "Atomic" combat), would have been the biggest carrier ever built from the keel up (65,000 tons displacement). The Navy argued that immobile overseas Air Force bases were vulnerable to political pressure and Soviet preemptive attack, while carriers, secure in the vast spaces of the Norwegian Sea, the Barents Sea, or the Mediterranean, could launch nuclear strikes on Soviet Naval bases or deep into the Russian heartland.

Claiming that the newly created Air Force could better deliver the new atomic weapons with their huge new B-36 bombers, Air Force leaders like General Carl "Tooey" Spaatz lobbied intensively to kill the new carrier program. By persuading the Truman Administration that they could deliver nuclear weapons more cheaply than the Navy, the Air Force succeeded in having the United States broken up on the building ways just days after her keel was laid (April 23rd, 1949). Soon afterward, the Secretary of the Navy, John L. Sullivan, resigned in protest, leading to the "Revolt of the Admirals" (discussed in the first chapter), which allowed the Navy to make a public case for conventional naval forces. Once the Truman Administration realized the political cost of killing the United States, the cuts in naval forces were stopped. It was just in time, as events turned out. For the carriers recently judged obsolete in an age of atomic warfare held the line in the conventional war that erupted in Korea on the morning of June 25th, 1950.

Even before the end of the Korean War, the Truman Administration recognized the need for new, bigger, more modern aircraft carriers. Though he was never a friend of the Navy, President Truman nevertheless belatedly authorized construction of a new class of "supercarriers" similar to the United States, canceled just three years earlier. The first of the new flattops was USS Forrestal (CVA-59-the "A" now reflecting the new "Attack" carrier designation), which was followed by three sister ships: Saratoga (CVA-60), Ranger (CVA-61), and Independence (CVA-62). These were huge vessels, at 1,039 feet/316 meters in length and almost sixty thousand tons displacement. The Forrestal class incorporated a number of innovations, almost all of British origin. A 14deg angled deck enabled planes to land safely on the angled section, while other planes were catapulting off the bow. Steam catapults allowed larger aircraft to be launched. Also, a stabilized landing light system guided pilots aboard more reliably than the old system of handheld signal paddles. Along with the new carriers came the first-generation naval jet aircraft. Meanwhile, the Navy initiated a huge Fleet Rebuilding and Modernization (FRAM) program for older carriers and other ships, both to give them another twenty years or so of service life and to delay the need to buy so many expensive new ships like Forrestal.

The first Cold War confrontation in which aircraft carriers played a major role was the Suez Crisis in 1956; carrier groups assigned to the U.S. Sixth Fleet spent the next year supporting operations by U.S. Marines and other forces trying to restore stability in Lebanon following the Arab-Israeli war. In 1958, Task Force 77 got a workout in the Far East when it interposed between the forces of Taiwan and Communist China during the crisis over the islands of Quemoy and Matsu. Meanwhile, two new follow-on supercarriers were ordered-Kitty Hawk (CVA-63) in 1956 and Constellation (CVA-64) in 1957. Essentially improved and enlarged Forrestal-class vessels, they approached the upper limits of size and capability for oil-fueled carriers. The time had come for a break with fossil-fueled power plants, and the carrier that followed was truly revolutionary.

The successful development of nuclear reactors to propel submarines encouraged the Navy to put them in surface ships. Backed by the mercurial Director of Naval Reactors, Vice Admiral Hyman Rickover, an improved Kitty Hawk design was developed to accommodate a nuclear propulsion plant. Ever eager to maximize the influence of nuclear power in the Navy, Admiral Rickover dictated that the new carrier should have just as many nuclear reactors (eight!) as there were oil-fired boilers in each Kitty Hawk-class carrier. When the new carrier, designated USS Enterprise (CVAN-65), was commissioned in the early 1960's, she was so overpowered that the structure of the ship could not stand the pounding of a full-power run. There are stories of speed runs off the Virginia capes in which the Enterprise went so fast (some say over forty knots; the actual numbers are still classified), that she left her destroyer escorts far behind, without tapping her full power.

Though Enterprise more than lived up to the heritage of her proud name, she was to be a one-of-a-kind ship. Then-Secretary of Defense Robert S. MacNamara, no friend of the Navy, blocked construction of more nuclear-powered carriers. Over the next decade, only two new carriers, America (CVA-66) and John F. Kennedy (CVA-67), would be constructed. These flattops, essentially repeats of the earlier Kitty Hawk-class, were powered by oil-fired boilers. After MacNamara's resignation in 1968, the ban on nuclear carrier construction lifted, and the Navy received authorization for a new class of three nuclear-powered attack carriers. This would become the mighty Nimitz-class (CVN-68) program.

The Nimitz-Class (CVN-68) Supercarriers

Because of the vast base of experience developed over the previous four decades, even before design of the Nimitz-class carriers began in the late 1960's, the Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) had a number of good ideas about what they wanted from their next generation of flattops. Frankly, they wanted a lot! The largest warships (in dimensions and displacement) ever planned at the time, the Nimitz-class carriers were to be the ultimate expression of sea-based airpower. Some of the "fighting" qualities of the Nimitz-class included:

• Aircraft Capacity-For over seventy-five years the value of a flattop has been measured by the number and types of aircraft it can carry. Ever since the Navy learned that the original USS Ranger was too small to carry a credible air wing, U.S. carrier designs have emphasized big flight and hangar decks to park, stow, and operate aircraft.[28] In addition, growth in the size and weight of combat aircraft has driven the design of carriers. For example, an F4F Wildcat fighter of 1941 left the deck at a maximum weight of 7,952 lb/3,607 kg, but today's F-14 Tomcat fighter has a maximum takeoff weight of 74,348 lb/33,724 kg! The Nimitz-class carriers were designed to handle ninety or more aircraft (though they currently operate with air groups of about seventy-five), depending on "spot factor" (the amount of deck space each aircraft type requires).

• Armament-Experience with heavy guns and long-range surface-to-air missile (SAM) batteries on earlier classes of aircraft carriers proved that the deck space, interior volume, manpower demands, and blast effects of such weapons interfered with air operations, the carrier's true reason for existence. Therefore, weapons on newer carriers would be limited to point defense (i.e., "last ditch" self-defense) systems like the RIM-7 Sea Sparrow surface-to-air missile (SAM) and Mk. 15 Phalanx/CIWS 20mm automatic cannon. A few.50-caliber machine guns would also be mounted for defense against suicide motor boats or terrorist swimmers.

• Crew Size-For centuries, experience has shown that the more sailors you cram aboard a warship, the better her fighting qualities, especially when you need to repair battle damage. On the other hand, sailors take up a lot of space, and generate large "hotel" loads on the ship's power plant (for electricity, water, heating, and cooling) that have nothing to do with fighting. Modern sailors are volunteers, who expect a minimum level of comfort. The Royal Navy's eighteen-inch spacing between hammocks aboard warships two centuries ago may have worked for impressed seamen, but would hardly do for today's sailors. Therefore, naval designers are constantly balancing the advantages of larger crews with the costs of personnel on ship size and capability. The Nimitz-class carriers would be designed to sail with about six thousand personnel on board: 155 officers and 2,980 sailors for the ship; 365 officers and 2,500 enlisted personnel for the air wing. Now add an admiral's staff, a few dozen civilian contractors to maintain the high-tech equipment, and a constant trickle of distinguished visitors and media representatives, and a carrier can get really crowded!

• Deployability-Since a crisis may be halfway around the world, a carrier needs to go fast. On the other hand, high speed is worthless if the carrier does not carry sufficient fuel to get where it has to go without frequent refueling. The interior space consumed by a large power plant and its fuel is not available for aircraft, crew berthing, ammunition, jet fuel, and other useful stowage. In the final analysis, the choice of a nuclear power plant was a no-brainer. The Nimitz-class carriers were designed to carry two General Electric A4W/A1G nuclear reactors, and were expected to operate for fifteen years between refuelings.[29] That's up to one million nautical miles of steaming on just one set of reactor cores.

• Sustainability-Once a carrier has reached an operating area, it must conduct operations for as long as possible without resupply since it may take weeks for fleet supply vessels to catch up with the carrier battle group. The enemy may not wait while you replenish at sea, so the amount of fuel, food, ammunition, and spare parts carried on board has a direct effect on how long a carrier can stay in action. It is also essential when fleet supply vessels reach the carriers; for when carriers are conducting Underway Replenishment (UNREP), basic safety rules dictate that they cannot operate aircraft or maneuver freely. Thus, the less often they take aboard fuel and supplies, the more time they can spend "on the line" conducting combat operations. The Nimitz-class carriers were designed to store up to nine thousand tons of jet fuel and almost two thousand tons of bombs, ammunition, and missiles. This is a vast improvement over earlier designs.

• Survivability-All of the above are worthless if the carrier is a blazing hulk about to turn turtle and sink. Nimitz-class carriers were designed in an era when the threat of Soviet cruise missiles and torpedoes armed with 1,000-kg/2,200-lb warheads was quite real. These weapons could blow a cruiser or destroyer in half, and do considerable harm to an aircraft carrier. The Navy was especially conscious of these dangers after three deadly fires aboard USN carriers during the Vietnam War had taken a high toll of lives, aircraft, and equipment. Remember that these ships are basically big boxes filled with explosives, jet fuel, and people, all packed tightly together. With all this in mind, the NAVSEA designers went to extreme lengths to make the new carriers both durable and survivable. The flight and hangar decks, as well as the hull, would be built from high-tensile steel, with a vast scheme of compartmentation and built-up structure. In addition, the new flattop would make only minimal use of light metals like aluminum, which are flammable under some easily reached fire conditions.

By the late 1960's the characteristics of what was initially known as SCB-102 (Ship Control Board Design 102) were firming up, with the following providing some idea of what the Navy desired:

• Displacement-Approximately 95,000 tons fully loaded.

• Size-A length of 1,092 feet/332.9 meters, beam of 134 feet/40.85 meters, a flight deck width of 250 feet/76.5 meters, and a maximum loaded draft of no more than 39 feet/11.9 meters.

• Power Plant-Two Westinghouse A4W nuclear reactors driving four General Electric steam turbines, turning four screws for a total of 280,000 shp. While the top speed is still classified, it is well over thirty-three knots.

• Manning-SCB-102 provided for a ship's company of 2,900 enlisted personnel and 160 officers. Room was additionally provided for two thousand air wing personnel, thirty Marines, and seventy members of the flag staff. This added up to almost 5,200 embarked personnel.

• Aircraft Complement-Approximately ninety aircraft. These would include improved models of aircraft like the F-4 Phantom II, A-6 Intruder, A-7 Corsair II, and E-2 Hawkeye, as well as newer and larger planes like the F-14 Tomcat, S-3 Viking, and EA-6B Prowler.

• Defensive Armament-Three eight-round RIM-7 Sea Sparrow SAM point-defense missile systems.

All of these features added up to the biggest class of warships ever built. Only the Enterprise had dimensions, displacement, and performance anything like the proposed SCB-102 design, and "the Big E" was lugging around eight nuclear reactors, the power of which could not be fully used. SCB-102 would be a much better balanced design-a fully integrated warship that would grow and modernize as the Cold War moved into the post-Vietnam era.

On the other hand, this very impressive package was going to be expensive and difficult to build. Because of foreign competition, America's private shipbuilding industry was in decline during the late 1960's. At the same time, government-owned yards run by the Navy were getting out of the ship construction business altogether to concentrate on overhauls and modernization work. This meant that only one shipyard in America was large enough to build the ships of the SCB-102 design-Newport News Shipbuilding (NNS) in Virginia. By 1967, NNS had been awarded a sole-source contract for the initial units of the new Nimitz class (CVN- 68). These eventually included the lead ship, which was named for the World War II Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet (CINCPAC), Admiral Chester Nimitz, and two other ships would be the Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69-named for the former President) and the Carl Vinson (CVN-70-named for the Georgia senator and political architect of America's World War II "Two Ocean Navy").

It would, however, be years until all three of the new ships were completed. Labor strikes and management problems plagued the construction of Nimitz, which took over seven years to complete (compared with four years for Enterprise). All three ships wound up costing hundreds of millions of dollars more than planned, making them fat targets for Congressional critics of Pentagon "fraud, waste, and abuse." The multi-billion-dollar price tag of the new ships meant that new carriers were going to be hard to sell to a nation that increasingly saw the military as a liability. In fact, not one new carrier was authorized by the Administration of President Jimmy Carter. However, a fourth unit of the Nimitz class, Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71-after the late President and father of the "Great White Fleet"), was forced upon President Carter by Congress, who funded the unit in Fiscal Year 1980 (FY-80). Others would follow.

The election of President Ronald Reagan launched a period of rebirth for the Navy. This rebirth, directed at the perceived threat of a growing and aggressive Soviet "Evil Empire," was the personal achievement of one man: then-Secretary of the Navy John Lehman. Lehman, himself a Naval aviator and heir to the wealth of a great Wall Street investment firm, called for a "600 Ship Navy," with fifteen aircraft carriers at its core.[30] Fiscal Year 1983 (FY-83) saw the authorization of two Nimitz-class nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) and George Washington (CVN-73). Navy leaders dubbed this program the "Presidential Mountain," because three of the presidents honored are carved on the Mount Rushmore monu-ment,and were strong supporters of the Navy.[31] Along with the three new carriers, over a hundred new nuclear submarines, guided-missile cruisers, destroyers, frigates, and support ships were authorized by the end of the 1980's. It was the biggest Naval building program since the Second World War.

Before the "Presidential Mountain" was completed, the global oceanic conflict they were designed to fight (or deter, if you thought that way) evaporated. With the end of the Cold War in 1991, the supercarriers acquired new roles and missions. In operations like Desert Shield/Desert Storm (Persian Gulf-1990/1991) and Uphold Democracy (Haiti-1994), they showed their great staying power and flexibility. Meanwhile, two more Nimitz-class carriers had been authorized in FY-88 to replace the last two units of the Midway class. This was just enough to keep the NNS shipyard alive. By the early 1990's it was time to plan on replacing the fossil-fueled carriers like Forrestal (CV-59) and America (CV-66), which were due to retire. Though at one point the Clinton Administration cut the number of carriers to eleven, the number was eventually stabilized at an even dozen (considered the minimum needed to sustain two or three forward-deployed carrier battle groups). In addition, in FY-95, another Nimitz-class ship was authorized, rounding out the third group of three. These three ships, John C. Stennis (CVN-74), Harry S. Truman (CVN-75), and Ronald Reagan (CVN-76), will hold the force level at twelve.[32]

In many ways, the Nimitz-class ships represent a "worst-case" design, able to accommodate the most difficult conditions and threats. Designed against a Cold War expectation of immense Soviet conventional and nuclear firepower, they are almost too much warship for an age where there is no credible threat against them. Whether America needs so much capability right now and in the near future is a matter I'll take up shortly. Meanwhile, let's look at how these great ships are put together.

Newport News Shipbuilding: Home of the Supercarriers

The Virginia Tidewater has been a cradle of American maritime tradition for almost four centuries. The first English colony in North America was established in 1607 on the south bank of the York Peninsula at Jamestown. Later, Hampton Roads was the scene of the world's first fight between ironclad ships, when the USS Monitor and CSS Virginia dueled in 1862.[33] Across the James River is the port of Norfolk, the most important naval base in the United States. And along the north bank of the James River is the town of Newport News, a twenty-mile-long snake-shaped community that is the birth-place of American aircraft carriers.

As you drive from Interstate 64 south onto Interstate 664, the yard makes its first appearance in the form of the huge pea-green-painted construction cranes that dominate the skyline of the city. And then as you turn off onto Washington Avenue, you will see the name on those cranes: Newport News Shipbuilding. Founded in 1886 by Collis P. Huntington, Newport News Shipbuilding (NNS) is the largest and most prosperous survivor of the American shipbuilding industry.[34] Seven of the battleships in "Teddy" Roosevelt's "Great White Fleet" were built here. Now one of just five U.S. yards still building deep-draft warships, NNS is the largest private employer in the state of Virginia, with some eighteen thousand workers (about half of the Cold War peak). The builder of the Ranger (CV-4-America's first carrier built from the keel up), NNS is the last U.S. shipyard capable of building big-deck nuclear carriers. Like most shipyards, NNS was originally built along a deep-channel river with inclined construction ways. Many of the original machine shops and dry docks are still in use after over a century of service. However, the facility has gradually been rebuilt into one of the most technically advanced and efficient shipyards in the world.

On the northern end of the yard you find the building area for aircraft carriers and other large ships. The centerpiece of this area is Dry Dock 12, where deep-draft ships are constructed. Almost 2,200 feet/670.6 meters long and over five stories deep, it is the largest construction dock in the Western Hemisphere. The entire area is built on landfill, with a concrete foundation supported on pilings driven through the James River silt into bedrock several hundred feet below. The concrete floor of Dry Dock 12 is particularly thick, to bear the immense weight of the ships built there. The end of the dock extends into the deep channel of the river, and is sealed off by a removable caisson (a hollow steel box). Running on tracks the length of Dry Dock 12 is a huge bridge crane, capable of lifting up to 900 tons/816.2 metric tons, while a number of smaller cranes run along the edge of the building dock. Dry Dock 12 can be split into two watertight sections by the movable caisson, so that one carrier and one or more smaller ships can be constructed at the same time.

Only a decade ago NNS could expect to start a new Nimitz-class aircraft carrier every two years or so. NNS also had a share of the twenty-nine planned Seawolf-class (SSN-21) submarines on order. There were also new classes of maritime prepositioning ships, as well as massive overhaul and modification contracts to support John Lehman's "600 Ship Navy." But today the outlook is dramatically different, and the number of projects under way has been scaled back radically:

• With the carrier force set at twelve flattops instead of fifteen, the U.S. only needs to build a carrier about every four years.

• The Seawolf program was terminated at just three boats, and the work on all three went to the General Dynamics Electric Boat Division. Thus the massive investment in specialized facilities and tooling for submarine construction will lie unused at NNS until the start of the New Attack Submarine (NSSN) program in the early 21st century.

• Now that several hundred U.S. Naval vessels are being retired because of cost and manpower, the massive overhaul and modification program is only a fraction of what was originally planned.

NNS nevertheless remains the only American shipyard capable of building nuclear-powered surface warships. If future carriers or any of their escorts are to be nuclear-powered, then NNS will build them. Since at least one more Nimitz-class carrier is planned (the as-yet-unnamed CVN-77), the yard will stay fat in flattop construction for another decade. Meanwhile, Congress has guaranteed NNS a share of the NSSN production with Electric Boat, allowing the company to utilize its investment in submarine construction facilities built for the Seawolf program years ago. There has also been a steady flow of Navy and commercial refit and modernization work, and this is proving to be highly lucrative. In fact, NNS is preparing for one of the biggest refits ever, when USS Nimitz (CVN-68) comes back into the yard for its first nuclear refueling.

Building the Boat

Before we actually go on board a Nimitz-class carrier, let's take a look at how the ship is built. A Nimitz-class CVN is among the largest man-made moving structures. And with a price tag around $4.2 billion, it is also among the most expensive. Only the biggest commercial supertankers are larger. Such vessels are mostly hollow space, and they aren't built to take anything like the punishment a warship must be able to absorb. On top of that, carriers must hold six thousand personnel and operate over ninety aircraft. And finally, no supertanker has a power plant of such impressive capability as the nuclear power plants on Nimitz-class-or one that requires such obsessive care. Every component of the nuclear power plant comes under the meticulous scrutiny of the Office of Naval Reactors. Very early in the history of U.S. Navy nuclear propulsion, it was realized that the first nuclear accident would mean the end of the program. Therefore, rigid inspection standards and elaborate safeguards were applied to every step of design, construction, and testing. For example, every welded pipe joint (there are thousands of them!) is X-rayed, to ensure that it has no flaws, cracks, or voids.

Strange as it may sound, building a 95,000-ton aircraft carrier is a precision operation, which requires immensely detailed planning. For example, the maximum draft of a ship being built at NNS is limited both by the size of Dry Dock 12 and by local tidal conditions. Even at an unusually high tide, Dry Dock 12 can be flooded only to a depth of about thirty-three feet/ten meters, meaning that construction of a carrier can be taken only so far before it must emerge out of the dock into the James River. Once that's done, the hull is moored to a dock on the eastern end of the yard for final construction and outfitting. Because of the quick-moving tidal conditions near the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, the launching is normally timed to the minute, and there are never more than a few inches to spare.

A Nimitz-class CVN gets its start in Washington, D.C., about a decade before its launching, when admirals at the headquarters of the Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA, formerly known as the Bureau of Ships, the agency that manages ship construction) fix the retirement date of an aging carrier. This determines the time line for budgeting a new flattop. The time line, almost a decade long, starts at the point when money begins to be committed to the building of the new ship. Soon after that, contracts are signed for "long-lead items"-those components that can take years to order, design, manufacture, and deliver. These include nuclear reactors, turbines, shafts, elevators, and other key items that must be installed early in the construction of the ship.

Budgeting must also take into account changes and new items that go into each new carrier, for each has literally thousands of changes and improvements over earlier ships of the class. To lower the drag of the hull, the most recent Nimitz-class carriers have bulbous bow extensions below the waterline. Lowering the hull drag extends the life of the reactor cores and allows power to be diverted from propulsion to the "hotel" systems like air-conditioning and freshwater production. Most design changes are not so significant, and usually involve nothing more than a material or component change, like a new kind of steam valve, electrical switch, or hydraulic pump. Even so, every change involves written change orders, as well as stacks of engineering drawings. Back in the 1960's and 1970's, a small army of draftsmen, engineers, and accountants was required to produce the mountain of paper documenting the changes on a new carrier. Today, a much smaller force manages a computerized drawing and change-management system custom-programmed for NNS. In fact, in the interest of efficiency and competitiveness, the entire NNS operation has become heavily computerized.

A prime example of computerization is the ordering-and-materials-control system. NNS cannot afford a huge inventory of steel plate and other materials sitting around rusting in the humid Tidewater climate. There is only limited space for storage and construction, and every bit must stay busy for NNS to turn a profit. To minimize this potential waste, NNS has installed a computerized "just-in-time" ordering-and-materials-control system. The many components and raw materials (steel plate, coatings, etc.) that go into a Nimitz-class carrier arrive exactly when they are needed. No earlier, and no later. In this way NNS's investment capital is not needlessly tied up, and the final cost to taxpayers is reduced by millions of dollars. The NNS work-force has also become more efficient, since fewer items need to be stored, protected, hauled from place to place, and inventoried.

The actual start of construction begins some months prior to the official date of the ceremonial keel-laying. At that time, the Dry Dock 12 cofferdam is placed so that about 1,100 feet/335.3 meters of room are opened at the rear of the dock. This leaves 900 feet/274.3 meters at the river-gate end of the dock for construction of tankers or other projects. NNS workers then begin to lay out the wooden and concrete structural blocks that the carrier will be built upon. Building a ship that displaces over 95,000 tons/86,100 metric tons on wood and concrete blocks may sound like building a skyscraper on a foundation of paper, but NNS uses lots of these blocks to spread the load around. This very old technique is also used when ships are brought into dry dock for deep maintenance. Some things just work, and cannot be improved upon.

The close tolerances in the construction of a Nimitz-class carrier demand absolute precision from the start. Exact placement of the first keel blocks is critical, as they represent the three-dimensional "zero" points upon which everything else is built. This preliminary work goes on for four to six months, until the keel-laying ceremony draws near. At the same time, some initial assemblies are welded together and stored on the floor of the dry dock, since storage space in the main construction yard is tight. At the ceremonial laying of the keel on a Nimitz-class vessel, the guests include the Secretary of the Navy, the Chief of Naval Operations, and hundreds of other dignitaries. By tradition, the ship's "sponsor" (a sort of nautical godmother) is appointed-usually the wife of a high-ranking Administration official or politician whose favor is being sought by the Navy. Then a ceremonial weld is made in the first "keel" member (a steel box girder built up along the centerline of the lowest part of the hull), and the carrier's construction is officially under way.

Now a thirty-three-month countdown clock starts. From this day forward to the launch date, the construction process is a race to determine the milestone bonuses and resulting profits for NNS stockholders. Meanwhile, Navy officials plan dates for commissioning and first deployments, select the "plankowner" officers and crew who will first man the new carrier, and assemble the "pre-commissioning unit" (PCU). These are the sailors who will report on board the ship while it is still under construction, in order to learn every detail of maintenance and operation.

Back at Dry Dock 12, the thirty-three-month construction moves forward rapidly. The secret to staying on schedule is "modular construction," a technique originally pioneered by Litton-Ingalls Shipbuilding in Mississippi. Rather than constructing a ship like a building, from the bottom up, the ship's designers break the design down into a series of modules. Each module is completed alongside the construction dock, with piping, fixtures, and heavy equipment already installed. Then it is lifted into place and "stacked" with other modules to form the hull. When that is done, the modules are "joined" (welded together). Pipes, ducts, and electric wiring bundles are connected into a mostly finished configuration, and the ship is "floated" out of the dock (or launched), with final work done alongside a "fitting-out" dock elsewhere in the yard. This mode of construction has many advantages. For one thing, the ship can be launched at a more advanced stage of construction than used to be the custom, which reduces costs considerably. Work that takes an hour to do in an NNS workshop usually takes three hours out in the yard, or eight hours in the ship once it is floating in the water. So anything that can be built in the shops or installed in the yard before it is assembled reduces costs; it is money in the bank.

Though modular military shipbuilding was pioneered by Litton-Ingalls, the scale at NNS is far greater. At NNS, they call this the "Superlift" concept. By way of comparison, Litton's largest module weighs around 500 tons/ 453.6 metric tons, while NNS utilizes modules up to 900 tons/816.6 metric tons lugged in place by the huge bridge crane. NNS can build a Nimitz-class carrier with about a hundred "Superlift" modules. Two dozen "Superlifts" make up a Nimitz-class carrier's flight deck, while the bow bulb and island structure are individual Superlifts.

A Superlift starts as a small mountain of steel plates, brought by rail and truck to NNS. Flame-cut to exact tolerances in the shops just south of Dry Dock 12, the plates are tack welded together by spot welds, then permanently joined by robotic welders along a pair of side-by-side production lines. These are then linked into the structural assemblies that form each Superlift. Once the basic structure is completed, cranes move it to the large assembly area next to Dry Dock 12. Then NNS yard workers crawl over and inside it to "stuff" electrical, steam, fuel, sewage, and other lines, fittings, and gear into place. Sometimes Superlifts are turned upside down, to make "stuffing" easier. When a Superlift is ready for joining, the nine-hundred-ton bridge crane is moved into position overhead, the lift cables are fastened, and the assembly in Dry Dock 12 made ready. Despite a Superlift's gigantic size and weight, this is a precision operation, with tolerances frequently dictated by the relative temperatures of the ship assembly and the Superlift. Depending on temperature, the metal structure of a Superlift can easily expand or contract over an inch during a given day on the Tidewater.

Around the assembly yard, several dozen Superlifts are in various stages of preparation at any given time. Some interior and exterior painting is done on Superlifts, to make this nasty and environmentally sensitive job a little safer. Because power, water, and air-conditioning can be installed in a Superlift while it is being assembled, the construction process is considerably facilitated. This is particularly helpful in the hot, muggy summers and cold, wet winters of the Tidewater region. There is a particular order to how Superlifts are stacked. The initial Superlifts-including the double bottom, reactors, steam power plants, ammunition magazines, and heavy machinery-are laid around the keel structure. In general, these items (making up the bottom of the middle third of the carrier) are the heaviest and most deeply buried components, and cannot be accessed or installed easily later on. They take some four months to assemble.

At twenty-two months to launch, everything aft to the fantail and up to the main/hangar deck is in place. Many of the living and habitation spaces are also included in this phase, as well as the majority of the carrier's protection systems (double bottoms, heavy plating, and voids-hollow spaces like fuel tanks, etc.). Now the assembly is beginning to look like a ship. At eighteen months to launch, the hangar deck is taking shape, along with the great overhanging "sponson" structures that extend out to port and starboard. Assembly of the bow is beginning. The flag (admiral's staff) and air wing spaces are fitted out, as well the offices for the various ship's departments. By fourteen months to launch, the hangar deck, sponson, and bow structures are in place, and the first parts of the flight deck are filling in amidships. After four more months, the hangar and flight decks are almost finished. Meanwhile, the lower bow has been completed, as well as the entire fantail structure. At two months before launch, the entire island structure-an eight-story building-is lifted onto the deck of the ship. This final Superlift represents the completion of major construction.

While the NNS yard workers seal up the hull and make it watertight, the managers and planners get ready for the actual launching of the ship. The launching ceremony is similar in many ways to the keel-laying just over two-and-a-half years earlier. Again, the Secretary of the Navy and the Chief of Naval Operations are present, as is the carrier's sponsor. She gets to break the traditional bottle of champagne over the new carrier's bow. A hint, though: Scratch the bottle first with a diamond-tipped scribe to ensure a clean break. Long-winded speeches, prayers, and benedictions complete the launching ritual. Then things get deadly serious and precise.

Since Dry Dock 12 is not deep enough to float off a finished Nimitz-class carrier, as soon as the hull structure is complete, it must be quickly floated out of the dock. Then the uncompleted carrier can be moved to a deeper part of the James River channel, where it can be moored to a fitting-out wharf for completion. The depth of the dock and the tidal conditions of the Tidewater region allow very little margin for error-meaning that the launching of a carrier is synchronized with the highest tide in a given month, to provide maximum clearance over the end of the dry-dock gate.

Before this can begin, any other ships in Dry Dock 12 are floated out and the movable cofferdam is removed. Then the dock is carefully flooded, with hundreds of NNS and Navy personnel monitoring tidal conditions and the watertight integrity of the carrier. When the dock is fully flooded and the ship has lifted off the keel blocks, the gate is opened. Now things happen fast. As a small tugboat pulls the carrier out of the dry dock, other tugboats wait just outside in the river to take control of the massive hulk. When the carrier is finally clear of the gate and safely into the deep channel of the river, it is turned and towed downstream to the fitting-out wharf on the southern end of the NNS property. Here it will be moored until it is turned over to the Navy, approximately two years later.

While it is an impressive sight sitting at the fitting-out dock, the mass of metal floating there is hardly a ship of war. It is still, in naval terminology, just a "hulk." Making it into a habitable vessel is the job of almost 2,600 NNS yard workers-everything from nuclear-reactor engineers to diesel-engine mechanics, computer specialists to roughneck welders. Building a modern warship takes almost every technology and tradecraft known. Imagine a skyscraper with offices, restaurants, workshops, stores, and apartments that can steam at more than thirty knots, with a four-and-a-half-acre airfield on the roof. That is a fair description of a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier.

During a visit to NNS in the fall of 1997, I spent some time aboard the USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75) while she was about nine months from commissioning and delivery. I'd like to share with you some of my experiences there. My first stop, after NNS and Navy officials led me aboard, was the massive hangar deck. At 684 feet/208.5 meters long, 108 feet/33 meters wide, and 25 feet/7.6 meters tall, it is designed to provide a dry, safe place to store and maintain the aircraft of the embarked wing. As we walked forward, I passed several large access holes that led into the two nuclear reactor compartments below. These would be buttoned up shortly, my guides told me. The nuclear fuel packages would then be installed, followed by testing and certification of the twin A4W reactor plants. All around the hangar deck, workers were busy welding and installing pieces of equipment.

After climbing several ladders, we emerged on the flight deck, where hundreds more NNS workers were hustling about at their tasks, and then moved forward to the catapults, which were in the process of testing and certification. They are installed in pairs on the bow and the deck angle port-side, and each of the four 302-foot/92.1-meter-long C13 Mod. 1 catapults is capable of launching an aircraft every few minutes (the cycle time depends largely on the skill of the deck crew). Each catapult is powered by a pair of steam cylinders, which are built into the flight deck, and normally use high-pressure saturated steam from the reactor plant; but since the reactors were not yet powered up, Truman drew her power, water, and steam from plants dockside.

Testing such powerful machines is a dramatic procedure. Scattered around the deck were a number of orange-painted, water-filled, wheeled trolleys called deadweights. Each deadweight simulates a fully loaded aircraft, with attachment points that allow it to be hitched to the shuttle of a catapult. After the bow has been pointed into the James River channel, and the Coast Guard and local boaters have been suitably warned, each catapult fires the entire range of deadweights. The tests are noisy and the sight of the weights flying hundreds of yards/meters into the channel is bizarre. Nevertheless, this is a highly effective way to prove that the machinery is ready. After leaving the catapults, we headed aft to inspect the catapult control station between Catapults 1 and 2.[35] Set on a hydraulically raised platform under an armored steel door, the control station is a pod where the catapult officer-or "shooter"-can control the catapults in safety and comfort. Another identical station is located on the port side, controlling Catapults 3 and 4.

Next we walked over to the island structure, where our guides showed us how the many systems on the flag and navigation bridges, the primary flight control, and the meteorology office were installed. Although the basic Nimitz design is over thirty years old, the many changes bringing it into the 21st century are quite visible. Up on the Truman's navigation bridge, for example, are many of the "Smart Ship" systems (mentioned in the second chapter) that make it possible for three people to steer the ship from auto-matedcontrol stations (before, almost two dozen people were required to do the same job). Similar systems will be scattered throughout the Truman, and will be tested when she goes to sea in 1998.

As we moved farther aft, we passed by the kinds of tool sheds and other temporary storage buildings that you find at any construction site. Then we dropped down a ladder back to the hangar deck and down another into the bowels of the ship. At this point, the primary work on Truman involved preparing some eight hundred (out of a total 2,700) compartments for turnover to the Navy. Those compartments contain crew berthing, medical facilities, galley and mess areas, office spaces, the ship's store, the post office, and storage rooms. Everything needed to finish these spaces must be carried up and down ladders and through narrow passageways by hand. Sprained knees and ankles are the price paid to haul paint cans, power cables, and tools into the ship.

Shortly after this job was completed, just after New Year's of 1998, the first of the Navy's crew of "plankowners" arrived. Several of the ship's spaces that had already been turned over proved to be spotless when we visited them; and the quality and workmanship are very impressive. In particular, the communications spaces, which were just being brought to life by a Navy crew, had the look and smell of a new automobile. As the final stop on my visit, I was allowed to visit the magazines and the pump room in the very bottom of the ship.

It was close to quitting time when we made our way back to the hangar deck, aft to the fantail, and down the access ramps to the dock. As we sat waiting for our tired leg muscles to loosen, the shift alarm went off, and we watched 2,600 NNS workers come off shift and head for home-an impressive sight. As they passed by us on the dock, I was reminded of the builders of the Egyptian pharaoh's pyramids. Both groups labored to build a wonder of the world. Unlike the pharaoh's slaves who hauled and stacked the stones in the desert, these people have chosen to labor at their "wonder of the world." They want these jobs, take pride in what they do, and make good livings. For those who think that Americans don't build anything worthwhile these days, I say go down to NNS and watch these great men and women build metal mountains that float, move, and fly airplanes off the top. It truly is the "NNS" miracle.

When the initial crew cadre came aboard Truman in early 1998, they began to help the NNS yard workers bring the ship's various systems to life. This process (ongoing until the ship is handed over to the Navy) is designed to make her ready for her "final exams," when the carrier will become truly seaworthy, with her reactors powered up and most of her "plankowner" crew aboard. Combat systems tests occur when the ship is about 98 % complete, with evaluations of the radar and radio electronics, defensive weapons, and all the vast network of internal communications and alarms. After these tests, it is time for sea trials off the Virginia capes, including speed runs to evaluate the power plant. After these trials are completed, the Navy conducts one last series of inspections prior to the most important ceremony of the entire building process (at least for NNS). This is the signing of the Federal Form DD-250, which indicates that the Navy has taken possession of the vessel and NNS can now be paid!

The next six to eight months are filled with training and readiness exercises, including the traditional "shakedown" cruise. Following this is a short period of yard maintenance (known as "Post Shakedown Availability") to fix any problems that have cropped up. The new carrier will then spend much of her time over at the Norfolk Naval Station, moored to one of the long carrier docks, where she will get ready for commissioning. At the commissioning ceremony, the high officials, the dignitaries, and the ship's sponsor once again gather. Again there are speeches and presentations. And almost a decade after the decision was made to build this mighty warship, a signal is given, the commissioning pennant is raised, the crew rushes aboard to man the sides, and she is finally a warship in the U.S. Navy.

The Nimitz Class: A Guided Tour

Let's now take a short walking tour of a Nimitz-class carrier. We'll start the way most guests come aboard, at the officers' accommodation brow on the starboard side just under the island. One of the first things you notice is the thickness of the hull, which is composed of high-strength steel several inches thick. It is that thick to protect against battle damage and fires. The same material makes up the flight and hangar decks, providing them with a similar resistance to damage and fires. Everywhere, there are redundant water and firefighting mains, with damage control stations in every passageway. The Navy is deadly serious about firefighting, and there even is a water deluge system, which can flood the deck, or wash it down in the event of a nuclear or chemical attack.

Past the entryway hatch, you take the first of many tall steps over structural members the crew calls "knee knockers." Though they are a constant nuisance to movement throughout the ship, these steel thresholds provide structural strength to the entire vessel. A Nimitz has miles of virtually indistinguishable passageways. And there are dozens of places in them where just standing around watching can be hazardous-due to noise, fumes, moving machinery, or simply wet, slippery decks. These passageways are considerably narrower than those in other combat vessels, particularly amphibious ships which have room for combat-loaded Marines to move around. Despite their huge size, carriers are volume-limited, and space for people to live, work, and walk takes away capacity for fuel, bombs, and fighting power. So getting around with any sort of load can be a genuine chore. You often see "bucket brigades" of sailors moving loads of food and other supplies from one place to another.

The narrow corridors are one important reason for the Navy's constant emphasis on simple courtesy. A senior officer or chief headed in the opposite direction always gets a respectful greeting and the right of way in these narrow passages. I learned a valuable lesson sometime ago from a civilian analyst who had spent many years on board Navy ships: "If you're standing anywhere and you're not touching metal, you're probably in somebody's way."

Moving inboard through several hatches, you emerge into the vast hangar deck; 684 feet/208.5 meters long, 108 feet/33 meters wide, and 25 feet/ 7.6 meters tall-about two-thirds the total length of the ship. Three immense sets of power-driven sliding armored doors divide the hangar bay into zones, to limit the spread of a fire or damage from explosions. In good weather, daylight floods in from four huge oval openings in the sidewalls where the elevators are located. In bad weather sliding barriers seal off the elevator openings to keep the interiors safe and dry. The elevators themselves are the largest aluminum structures on the ship (to save weight). Each of these mammoth lifts (one on each side aft, with two others forward on the starboard side) can raise two fully loaded F-14 Tomcats (the heaviest carrier aircraft) to the flight deck at one time. This is one of the few places on the ship where you can actually see the sea and sky, and remind yourself of the outside world. The flight deck, by contrast, is a highly restricted area. Since there are no portholes, most of the crew rarely sees the light of day. You often find crew members who go days and weeks at a time without either a breath of fresh air or a view of the outside world.

The hangar deck is one of the three main horizontal structures on a carrier (the flight deck and keel/double bottom are the other two), and it provides much of the stiffness and protection for the rest of the ship. Any damage from hits on a carrier should be contained outside the armored boxes that surround the hangar deck and engineering/living spaces below. When it's empty, you would have room to play two games of American football in the hanger bay. But when it's filled with fifty or sixty aircraft only inches apart, there is barely room to worm your way through the mass of landing gear, pylons, and maintenance equipment. The hangar deck is always packed with airplanes and equipment, though there is not enough room to strike down all of the air wing's birds at one time. This means that some of the birds must always be parked on the flight deck. Fortunately, Naval aircraft are designed to withstand the corrosive effects of salt water, and can take the punishment fairly well.

Just aft of the elevator bay is a large stowage area where the ship's boats are stacked, along with bulky items like forklifts, spare arresting cable reels, and spare engines. Moving aft from this holding area, you find the engine and maintenance shops, which completely fill the stern of the ship. Here the ship's Aircraft Intermediate Maintenance Division (AIMD) repairs, overhauls, and tests engines, hydraulic pumps, electronics boxes, and countless other mechanical components that keep planes flyable and combat-ready. The maintenance shops are divided up into small spaces where work is done that normally takes acres of workshops and hangars back ashore.

Farther aft of the AIMD shops, you again break out into daylight on the stern, or fantail, of the ship, an open area the full width of the hull, roofed by the flight deck, with projecting platforms and catwalks on either side. Mounted on the fantail are massive test stands, where aircraft engines can be strapped down and run at full power. Because no bit of open space goes to waste on a carrier, you'll only rarely find a time when you can just stand back here and watch the ocean go by. This is especially true during flight operations. If an aircraft should hit the stern (in what aviators dryly call a "ramp strike"), the fantail is going to be showered with flaming jet fuel and debris. Such accidents are very rare, but they do happen, which means that unless you work there, you aren't permitted on the fantail. So if you get to see this spot while under way, count yourself lucky.

Here also are one of the four (three on the Nimitz (CVN-68), Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69), and Carl Vinson (CVN-70)) Mk. 15 Phalanx Close-In Weapons Systems (CIWS). A pedestal-mounted 20mm Gatling gun with its own tracking radar, the Mk. 15 is designed to knock down incoming missiles and aircraft. Phalanx has now been in service for almost twenty years, and is considered marginal against the latest threat systems (like the sea-skimming, Mach 2 Russian Kh-41/SS-N-22 Sunburn missile). The Mk. 15's will eventually be replaced by twenty-one-round launchers for the Rolling Airframe Missile (RIM-116A RAM). RAM is based on the classic AIM-9 Sidewinder air-to-air missile, with a modified seeker from a Stinger (FIM-92) man- portable SAM. RAM-much more capable than the Mk. 15-can actually destroy an incoming Mach 2 missile before it hits (or showers the ship with supersonic fragments).

Located below the Phalanx mount are the twin ports for the ships SLQ-25A "Nixie" torpedo countermeasures system. Nixie is a towed noisemaker streamed behind the ship when there is a threat of incoming torpedoes. The idea is that the "fish" will chase the towed decoy, and detonate against it instead of the ship. Since each decoy can be used only once, two Nixie decoys are kept at the ready, each at the end of a spooled tether in the stern. Finally, on a platform at the stem next to the Mk. 15 stands the instrument landing system. This is a stabilized "T"-shaped bar of vertical and horizontal lights, which helps a pilot on final approach judge the roll and motion of the ship.

Heading back forward into the hangar bay, you will probably notice the "spongy" feel of the deck, which comes from the grayish-black non-skid coating that is applied to seemingly every horizontal surface exposed to the weather. Non-skid-a mix of abrasive grit and synthetic rubber applied in a rippled pattern-keeps you from slipping on a wet, oily, or tilted deck, an all too common occurrence on a naval vessel. Up on the flight deck, the constant pounding and scraping of landing gear and tailhooks quickly erode the coating and expose bare steel. When this happens, maintenance crews mix up a batch and "touch up" worn spots. Also notable is the hangar deck's elaborate fire-suppression system, which can put enough foam into the hangar bay to drown the unwary. Fire hoses and mains sprout from every corner of the hangar bay, and damage control gear is also in evidence.

In the overhead are storage racks for everything from aircraft drop tanks to spare engines. You can even see a spare catapult piston-a steel forging as long as a bus-racked high on the wall of the hangar bay. In the forward part of the hangar bay on the starboard side are two more aircraft elevators, as well as the passageways that lead into the forecastle. Here you find more AIMD offices and shops, as well as most of the berthing spaces for enlisted personnel from the embarked air wing. Cramming almost six thousand personnel into a ship, even though it's close to a quarter mile long, makes for tight quarters. Even so, the enlisted and chiefs' berthing spaces on a Nimitz are still more comfortable than those aboard a submarine or older Navy surface warship.

For a young person coming aboard a warship for the first time, the cramped personal space may seem harsh. In fact, while personal space is spartan, it is nevertheless quite functional. Enlisted personnel get a stowage bin under their bunks, and a single upright locker about the size of the one you had back in high school. They can also stow some personal items in their workspaces, but they still must always plan ahead when packing to go aboard ship. For sleeping, crew will normally be assigned to a bunk (called a "rack"), which will be one in a stack of three. You will find around sixty racks in a berthing space, with an attached rest room/shower facility (what the Navy calls a "head"), and a small common area with a table, chairs, and television connected to the ship's cable system. Television monitors can be found in almost every space on board, displaying everything from the ship's Plan of the Day (called the "POD"), to movies, CNN Headline News, and the "plat cams"-a series of television cameras that monitor activities on the flight deck.

The racks themselves are narrow single beds, with a comfortable foam-rubber mattress, and basic bedding. There are also privacy curtains, a small reading lamp, and usually a fresh-air vent-often a vital necessity. While most of the interior spaces of a Nimitz are air-conditioned, even nuclear-powered chillers sometimes have a hard time keeping up with the hot and humid conditions in the Persian Gulf or the Atlantic Gulf Stream in summer. That stream of cool air on your face is sometimes all that lets you sleep. Other distractions on board can also keep you from getting rest, such as the launching and landing of high-performance combat aircraft on the roof. Crew members with quarters just below the catapults and arresting gear have a hard time sleeping when night flight operations are running, which is why the air wing personnel are berthed here. When the wing is flying, they would not be in their racks anyway.

Forward of the living spaces, in the very bow of the ship, is the forecastle. Here the anchors, handling gear, and their huge chains are located. It is also the domain of the most traditional jobs in the Navy: the Deck Division. In an era of computers and guided weapons, these are the sailors who can still tie every kind of knot, rig mooring lines, and handle small boats in foul weather. You need these people to operate anything bigger than a rowboat, and aboard a carrier they are indispensable. On the port side of the forecastle you find the first of a set of "stairs," which we'll use to climb up several levels. These are not conventional stairways, but very nearly vertical ladders, and they are quite narrow. You learn to move up and down ships' ladders carefully, and finding a handy stanchion to grasp when you're on them becomes instinctive.

Opening another hatch, you find yourself on a small platform adjacent to the bow. From here, you can climb a few steps and move out onto the four and a half acres that is the carrier's flight deck. Again, the spongy feel of the deck tells you that there is non-skid under your feet. Around the deck, two or three dozen aircraft are packed in tight clusters, to free as much deck space as possible. During flight operations, the noise is incredible. It is so loud that you must wear earplugs just to watch from up on the island, while flight deck personnel who must work among the aircraft wear special "cranial" helmets with thickly padded ear protectors to preserve their hearing. Only Landing Signals Officers (LSOs, the people who guide aircraft during landings) are allowed on deck during flight operations without a cranial, since they have to clearly hear and see aircraft as they approach the stern for landing.

There are other hazards as well. In fact, the flight deck of a modern aircraft carrier is arguably the most dangerous workplace in the world. Aircraft are constantly threatening to either suck flight deck personnel into their engines, or blow them off of the deck into the ocean. For this reason, the entire perimeter of the flight deck and the elevators is rigged with safety nets. In addition, everyone on the flight deck also wears a "float coat," which is an inflatable life jacket with water-activated flashing strobe light, and a whistle to call for help-just in case the safety nets don't catch you. Standard flight deck apparel also includes steel-toed boots, thick insulated fabric gloves, and goggles (in case a fragment of non-skid or some foreign object/ debris-FOD-is blown into your face).

Each float coat and cranial is color-coded by job. Under the float coats, deck crews also wear jerseys-heavy, long sleeved T-shirts-of the same color as the float coat (though they may be a different color from the cranials). These color-code combinations are universal aboard Navy ships. Here is what they mean:

For example, only sailors wearing purple coats, jerseys, and cranials are allowed to handle fuel and other flammable fluids on deck (they are nicknamed the "grapes").

Keeping an eye on flight-deck operations is a vital task. Up on the island, observers constantly watch the position and flow of planes, personnel, and equipment around the deck. Any deviation from standard procedures or safety rules calls down a sharp and angry rebuke over the flight deck loudspeaker (loud enough to hear through your cranial-and that is really LOUD) telling you exactly what you must do RIGHT NOW! To help these commands make sense, there is a standard set of coordinates and definitions for the various parts of the flight deck. For example, the catapults are numbered from 1 through 4 in order, starboard to port, bow to stern. The elevators are numbered, with 1 and 2 ahead of the island on the starboard side, number 3 just aft, and number four on the port side aft. The jet blast deflectors (JBDs) are matched to the catapults, 1 through 4. The arresting wires are also numbered, running from number 1 farthest aft, to number 4 up forward. Areas of the deck also have specific names, so that when an observer or lookout yells out a warning, he can direct other eyes to it without delay. Some examples include:

• The "Crotch"-The point where the roughly 14deg landing deck "Angle" ends and the port bow begins.

• The "Junkyard"-The area at the base of the island aft. Here tractors, forklifts, a wrecking crane, and the world's smallest fire truck (collectively known as "yellow gear" even though some are now painted white) are parked, always ready to move when needed.

• The "Hummer Hole"-The area just forward of the Junkyard. Here the E-2C Hawkeyes (nicknamed "Hummers") and their cargo-carrying cousins, the C-2 Greyhounds, are parked.

• The "Street"-The " Street" is up on the bow in the area between Catapults 1 and 2; the forward catapult control pod is located there.

• The "Rows"-Also on the bow are the "1 Row" and "2 Row." These are the zones outboard of Catapults 1 and 2 and are normally used as parking areas for the F/A-18 Hornets when a landing event is active.

• The "Finger"-A narrow strip of deck just aft of Elevator 4, with parking space for a single plane.

Working in this noisy, hot, and dangerous world is the job of some of the bravest young men and women you will ever meet. Most are under twenty-five; and some look so naive (or so scary), you might not trust them to valet park your car at a restaurant. Yet the Navy trusts them to safely handle aircraft worth several billion dollars, not to mention the infinitely precious lives of air crews, each representing millions of dollars in training and experience.

Theirs is a world of extremes. For up to eighteen hours a day, they're subjected to noise that would deafen if not muffled; heat and cold that would kill if not insulated. They are surrounded by explosives, fuel, and other dangerous substances,[36] and are frequently buffeted by winds of over sixty knots. For this, they receive a special kind of respect and a "hazardous duty" bonus (in 1998, about $130 per month) in addition to their sea pay. These young men and women know their work makes flying aircraft on and off the boat possible, and they take quiet pride in this dirty, dangerous job up on "the roof." Because of the extreme noise, a richly expressive sign language is used to direct operations on the flight deck. Using a series of common and easily understood hand signals, the deck crew personnel tell each other how to move aircraft and load bombs and equipment, and warn each other of emergencies. They constantly watch out for each other, for only the brother or sister sailor looking out for you keeps you safe. All of these efforts are dedicated to just two basic tasks: the launching and landing of aircraft. Let's now look at how it is done in somewhat greater detail.

If you move aft from the bow down the "Street," you walk between the two bow catapults, each as long as an American football field. And there is a similar catapult arrangement on the landing "angle" on the port side. Most of the machinery for each C13 Mod. 1 catapult is concealed under the flight deck: two slotted cylinders in a long steel trough, each with a narrow gap along the top. Overlapping synthetic rubber flangles cover and seal the gaps. In each cylinder is a piston, with a lug projecting through the sealing strips on top. Each of these lugs leads to a small crablike fixture called a "shuttle," which is up on the flight deck.

When an aircraft is ready to launch, it is maneuvered into position under the guidance of a plane handler. When the nosewheel is just behind the shuttle, a metal attachment on the gear strut, called a towbar, is lowered into a slot on the shuttle. Meanwhile, the Jet Blast Deflector (JBD) just aft of the plane is raised, and another mechanical arm is attached to the rear of the nose gear strut with a device called a "holdback."[37] This allows the aircraft to run its engines up to full power, far beyond the ability of the plane's brakes to keep it on the deck. In this way, the bird will have a considerable forward thrust even before it starts moving. Each aircraft type in the wing has its own special color-coded holdback, to prevent them from being used mistakenly on the wrong bird. The exceptions are the F-14 Tomcat and F/ A-18 Hornet, which have permanent holdback devices built into their nosewheelgear struts.

Once the aircraft is properly hooked up by one of the green-shirted catapult crewmen, another "green shirt" holds up a chalkboard with the plane's expected takeoff weight written on it for the pilot and catapult officer (down in the catapult control pod) to see. If both agree that the number is correct (confirmed by hand signals), then the catapult officer (known as the "shooter") begins to fill the twin pistons with a pressurized charge of saturated steam from the ship's reactor plant.[38] The steam pressure is carefully regulated to match the takeoff weight of the aircraft, the speed of the wind over the deck (this is the natural wind speed plus the speed of the ship), and other factors like heat, air pressure/density, and humidity. This has to be very precise. Too much pressure will rip the nosewheel gear out of the plane, while too little will cause a "cold shot." In a cold shot, the aircraft runs down the deck and never reaches takeoff speed; the catapult then hurls it into the water ahead of the onrushing carrier.[39] At best, the crew will eject and the aircraft will be lost. At worst, both the aircraft and flight crew will be lost. As might be imagined, catapult officers (who are themselves veteran carrier aviators) take this highly responsible job quite seriously.

Once the pressure is at the desired level, there is a final check of the aircraft by the green shirts. If all appears to be at readiness, the catapult officer signals this to the pilot. The pilot selects the proper engine setting (usually maximum power or afterburner), snaps a salute back to the catapult officer in the pod, and braces for what is about to come. At that point, the catapult "shooter" hits a button in the control pod, and the twin cylinders are released. This snaps the holdback and throws the aircraft down the catapult track. The pilot/crew is hit with several times the force of gravity (what pilots call "G" forces), and their eyes are driven back into their sockets. Approximately one hundred yards/ninety meters and two seconds later, the towbar pops out of the shuttle, and the aircraft is on its own. Having achieved flying speed (usually around 150 knots), the pilot has now gained control of the airplane (that is, he or she can actually fly it).

Back on deck, a cable and pulley system retracts the shuttle to its start position, and the cycle repeats. A well-trained crew can complete this process in less than two minutes. A normal launch sequence using all four catapults can put an airplane into the air every twenty to thirty seconds. This means that launch events for several dozen aircraft can take less than fifteen minutes from start to finish. However, since the aircraft just launched will be back to land in only a couple of hours, the timing of what gets done next can be critical.

Configuring the flight deck for a landing "event" requires that the deck be "respotted," with as many aircraft as possible moved forward. In most cases, these are parked on Rows 1 and 2, so that the "angle" will be clear for returning aircraft; and this means that Catapults 1 and 2 are now blocked and unavailable for use. While it is theoretically possible to launch aircraft during landing operations, this is rarely done. To do so would require much of the air wing to be struck below to the hangar deck, a time-consuming and tiring exercise for the deck crews. In fact, carrier captains like to use the aircraft elevators as little as possible, since these constitute part of the flight deck and parking area for aircraft when they are in the "up" position. It's hard to find anything more precious to a carrier skipper than flight deck space, and even the four and a half acres on a Nimitz-class flattop seems small when filled with airplanes, ordnance, equipment, and people.

The flight deck can not only get crowded, it can easily become dangerous. For this reason aircraft that are not actually taking off or landing are parked and chained down as quickly as possible. Chaining down is also necessary because a slight list on a slick deck can send an aircraft sliding around like a rogue hockey puck on an ice rink. In fact, almost everything on deck is chained down when it is not in use, including the low-rise firefighting and aircraft tractor vehicles. Normally, as soon as an aircraft is shut down and parked, a crew of strong-backed young blue shirts moves in to attach tie-down chains to some of the thousands of tie-down points imbedded in the plating of the flight deck.

On the port side aft is a sponson holding what is called the "Lens." This is a stabilized (against the motion of the ship) system of lights and directional lenses, designed to provide approaching pilots with a visual glide path down to the deck. If an approaching aircraft has the proper attitude and sink rate, then the pilot sees an amber light-or "meatball"-from the system. If the pilot can keep the "ball" centered (with a row of green lights) all the way down (any offset from the proper attitude shows the pilot a row of "red" lights), then it should put him down in the perfect spot for a landing on the deck aft.

Once the flight deck has been respotted for the coming landing event, and the ship has once again come into the wind, things again get exciting. Modern carrier aircraft are too heavy and their stall speeds are too high to possibly land in the roughly 500 feet/152 meters of space on the flight deck. In fact, the only way to get a high-performance airplane onto a carrier deck is to literally fly it to a "controlled" crash, and stop it forcibly before it falls into the sea. The lens system and other special landing instruments (some aircraft even have an automatic landing system) are useful aids, but pilots usually need additional help. This formidable task is the job of a lot of very special equipment and is overseen by the Landing Signals Officers (LSOs). Back in the old days of propeller-driven planes and the early jets, LSOs were the only landing aid for pilots. They did their job with nothing more than a pair of lighted paddles (to show the pilots their landing attitude) and a few hand signals. LSOs today do their job from a small platform on the port side aft, and it is there that we now will go to get a perspective on the fine art of a carrier landing.

Landing a carrier aircraft starts in the aircraft cockpit, when the pilot makes the break into the ship's landing pattern. The pattern itself is controlled by the Carrier Air Traffic Control Center (CATCC) located one level down from the flight deck. The CATCC is a miniature of what you would find at any major airport, and it functions in exactly the same way. The controller's job is to "stack" the aircraft, prioritize them into an oval-shaped pattern about a mile wide and four miles long around the port side of the carrier, and "stagger" them, so the LSO has the necessary time to bring each aboard. (They can land an aircraft about every thirty seconds under good conditions.) The aircraft in the pattern are prioritized by their "fuel state," a polite way of saying that the first planes to be brought aboard are the ones that are about to fall into the ocean from fuel starvation. Just to be sure this does not happen, the carrier usually has an airborne tanker overhead during flight operations to refuel airplanes too close to the Empty point on their fuel gauges.

When the landing event has been properly organized, the "Lens" is turned on, and the first pilot in the pattern makes the "break" out of the pattern to line up on the stern of the carrier. During the "downwind" leg of the pattern, the pilot drops the plane's landing gear, tailhook, and flaps, makes sure the radio is set up on the LSO frequency, and turns left toward the boat. Assuming all this has been done properly, the aircraft should start its final approach at eight hundred feet altitude, about three-quarters of a mile from the stern of the carrier, and just fifteen seconds from touchdown.

As the aircraft finishes its break, the LSO orders the pilot over the radio to "Call the ball!" This tells the pilot to let the LSO know that he has spotted the amber "meatball" of the landing system. If the pilot does see it, he or she calls "Roger ball!" back to the LSO to confirm that. At this point, the final ten-second dash to the deck is on. On the LSO platform, the LSO and an assistant are watching and judging the aircraft's attitude. Highly experienced pilots themselves, LSOs are expert judges of all this. In his or her hand, the LSO holds what is known as the "pickle." This controls a series of lights near the LSO platform, which are visible to aircraft approaching the stem. As long as the aircraft continues properly on course, the pilot gets a green "OK" light. But the LSO can also activate "more power" and "wave off" lights with the "pickle." The LSO can also coach the pilot by radio, but this is not normally done. Since an enemy could intercept radio signals in wartime conditions, "emissions control" procedures (called EMCOM Alpha in its most extreme form) dictate that combat landing operations be done only with lights. If the aircraft is set up properly, it should now be about thirty feet over the fantail, with airspeed of around 130 knots/240 kph, and a decided nose-up attitude. At this point, the pilot and LSO have done their part of the job, and it is the turn of machinery to finish it.

Handling this task is the ship's arresting gear system, located in the middle of the 14deg angle aft. Stretched across the deck are four braided steel cables (called "wires" by the crew), numbered 1 through 4, from rear to front. The wires are spaced about fifty feet apart, and each is hooked to a pair of hydraulic cylinders located one deck below. If the pilot and LSO have set the landing up properly, the aircraft should hit the deck in the roughly two-hundred-foot/sixty-one-meter-by-fifty-foot/fifteen-meter rectangle formed by the wire system. If this happens, the tailhook hanging from the rear of the aircraft should snag one of the wires. If a successful "trap" occurs, the aircraft and hook pull the wire out of its spools belowdecks, and the hydraulic cylinders slow the aircraft to a stop in about 300 feet/91.4 meters, in just two seconds. The crew is then thrown forward in their straps, and lots of negative (forward) "Gs" nearly push their eyeballs out of their sockets.

Once the aircraft is safely aboard, a green-shirted deck crew member called a "hook runner" clears the landing wire from the hook, while a "blue shirt" plane handler starts directing the pilot to taxi forward out of the landing area. When the aircraft is clear of the angle, the arresting cable is retracted and made ready for the next landing. While all this is happening, the LSO is writing down a "score" for each pilot's landing. They grade two factors. First, the general way the pilot actually flew the approach and landing. An "OK" means that this was done safely and to accepted standards. Second, the wire the pilot "snagged." As we saw earlier in the first chapter, the favored target is wire number 3, which provides the safest landing conditions and the least strain on the aircraft. Landings on wires 2 and 4, while acceptable, merit a lower score; but hitting wire number 1 is considered dangerous and usually brings the pilot counseling from the LSO.

Each pilot's landing scores are posted on what is known as the "greenie" board down in the squadron ready room for all to see. These scores are accumulated, and by the end of an entire cruise, a "Top Hook" award is given to the pilot with the best landing record. The scores also frequently affect the ratings of the pilot's airmanship, which affects their future promotion hopes. Great "Hooks" may go to test pilot school or become instructors, while those with lower scores may never fly off a ship again.

In the first chapter, I had occasion to mention one of the rules that every Naval aviator learns early: As soon as the aircraft hits the deck, push the throttles to full power. In this way, if the tailhook fails to snag a wire (called a "bolter"), he has the necessary speed to fly off the end of the angle, and get back into the landing pattern for another try. Bolters happen fairly rarely these days, though every Naval aviator still experiences them now and again. Sometimes the tailhook skips off of the deck, or just fails to connect. Whatever the reason, the 14deg angled deck makes it possible for the pilot to go around again, and get aboard another time. Angled decks have saved more aircraft and aviators' lives than any invention since the development of tailhooks. The pilot just climbs out into the traffic pattern and sets up for another try. There also is an emergency net or "barrier" that can be rigged to catch an aircraft that cannot be otherwise snagged by an arresting wire. This, however, is something that no Naval aviator cares to try out if it can be avoided.

Continuing the tour of the flight deck, you can see scattered around the perimeter of the deck many different fittings and nozzles. These provide everything from jet fuel to AFFF (Aqueous Film-Forming Foam). There is also a seawater deluge system, for nuclear/chemical washdowns and fighting really bad fires, as well as "chutes" where deck personnel can drop ordinance in danger of "cooking off," should they get too hot from a deck fire. This is another of the many risks faced by flight deck personnel, though they would tell you that not doing the "dangerous" things on "the roof" is a good way to get everyone aboard killed. These are brave people, who do heroic things every time a flight evolution takes place. I defy any nation to effectively operate sea-based aircraft without such folks.

Moving on to the island, you open another hatch, head inside, and climb up six ladders to the 010 level and the Primary Flight Control, or "Pri-Fly," as it is called. Here, some six stories above the flight deck, is the control tower for the carrier, where all the operations of the flight deck and the local airspace are handled by the Air Boss and the "Mini" Boss, his (or her) assistant. They are surrounded by computer displays showing everything they need to help them control the air action around the ship.

Climb down another ladder, and you arrive on the bridge, where the captain spends most of his time. On the port side is a comfortable elevated leather chair, which belongs to the commanding officer, and from which he normally cons the ship (flanked by computer screens). Over on the starboard side of the bridge are the actual conning stations, including the wheel, chart table, and positions for several lookouts. Even though the bridge is equipped with a GPS receiver, advanced radars, and all manner of electronic aids, human eyes and binoculars are still important to the safe conning of a carrier.

Just aft of Pri-Fly is arguably the most popular spot on board, "Vultures Row"-an open-air balcony overlooking the flight deck (and a good place to take in some sun). There anyone can safely watch the comings and goings below (bring your camera and earplugs!). It also offers a wide view of the whole ship, especially the defensive and sensor system.

From there you can see the sponson mounts for the eight-round Mk. 29 Sea Sparrow SAM launchers. The Nimitz-class carriers each have three of these systems, one forward on the starboard side, with the other two aft (port and starboard). The RIM-7M Sea Sparrow is a short-range SAM, designed to support the Mk. 15 CIWS mounts in defending the ship against any "leaker" aircraft or missile that makes it past the screen of Aegis missile cruisers and destroyers supporting the carrier group. Based upon the venerable AIM-7 Sparrow air-to-air missile (AAM), Sea Sparrow was originally developed to provide small ships like frigates and destroyers with a short-range point-defense SAM at a reasonable cost. NATO adopted the system as the standard short-range SAM system for small escorts. Like its AAM cousin, Sea Sparrow utilizes a guidance system known as "semi-active" homing. This means that a Mk. 91 fire-control radar (each Nimitz-class carrier has three of these) "illuminates" an incoming missile or aircraft, much as a flashlight is aimed at an object in a dark room. The seeker head of the missile "sees" the targets reflected radar energy from the Mk. 91 radar. The guidance system of the missile then automatically provides it tracking to the target.[40]

Sea Sparrow is an excellent point-defense system that gives the ship good protection out to a range of up to 10 nm/18.5 km. Back in the 1980's, it was enhanced through the addition of a Mk. 23 Target Acquisition System (TAS) radar. This fast-rotating system can detect low-flying and high-angle targets, and then pass them along automatically to the Sea Sparrow system for engagement. The system's only drawback is that once the eight ready rounds have been fired from the Mk. 29, the launcher must be manually reloaded. Sea Sparrow is being improved through the development of the Enhanced Sea Sparrow Missile (ESSM) System, which marries the basic seeker system with a new airframe. This will give ESSM more range and performance than RIM- 7M, as well as the ability to be fired from both Mk. 29's and the Mk. 41 vertical launch system (VLS) launchers found on newer warships.

Unlike surface ships, flattops do not have many convenient spots for placing antennas for radios and sensors. This has to do partly with maintaining appropriate separation between emitting antennas, and partly with the need to avoid clutter on the flight deck during flight operations. For this reason, the island structures of American carriers have always been antenna farms. You'll also find a number of UHF/VHF radio antennas on the edge of the flight deck, placed on special mounts that rotate horizontally during flight operations. On Nimitz-class carriers there is additionally a large antenna mast just aft of the island, to hold those radar and communications antennas that need to be as high as possible. These masts and mounts hold a variety of sensors including:

• SPS-48E-A 3-D air-search radar that provides air traffic control and battle management functions. This high-resolution radar has a reported range out to approximately 60 nm/110 km.

• SPS-49(V)5-This is the best current Naval 2-D air-search radar. Extremely reliable, with a detection range of up to several hundred miles/ kilometers, SPS-49's are found on most major combatants in the U.S. Navy, as well as many foreign vessels.

• SPS-64(V)9-This is primarily a surface-search/navigation radar for keeping formation and operating close to shore. It is a development of the classic Litton LN-66 navigation radar.

• SPS-67-The SPS-67 is a general-purpose surface-search radar, designed to provide precise targeting data against surface targets.

• Mk. 23 Target Acquisition System (TAS)-This is a small, fast-rotating radar for detecting sea-skimming or high-angle missile attacks. It feeds data directly into the SYS-2 (V)3 weapons-control system, which can automatically activate the RIM-7/Mk. 29 Sea Sparrow SAM systems.

• Mk. 91 Fire Control System (FCS)-The three Mk. 91 FCSs provide guidance for the RIM-7M Sea Sparrow SAM launched by the three Mk. 29 launchers.

• SLQ-32 (V)4-The SLQ-32 is a family of electronic-warfare systems, which can be tailored to the protection requirements of a particular ship. The (V)4 version has a wide-band radar-warning receiver, a wide-band radar jammer, and a bank of Mk. 137 Super Rapid Blooming Chaff (SRBOC) launchers. These six-barreled mortars throw up a cloud of chaff (metal-coated Mylar strips) and infrared decoys to blind or confuse an incoming missile at the last moment prior to an attack.

• WRL-1H-The WRL-1H is a general-purpose wide-band radio/radar-warning /intercept receiver, designed to provide a basic intercept capability for everything from radio traffic to bearings on radar sets.

These systems give the carrier's commanding officer and battle group staff good situational awareness of the battle space surrounding their ship and the ARG. Along with the supporting sensor systems, the island also provides mounts for many of the ship's communications systems. While many of these are classified, they cover the full range of the electromagnetic spectrum and functions. The most interesting of these are the domed antennas for the satellite communications systems, which provide much of the high-reliability secure communications for the battle group.

Since they were originally designed primarily to transmit encoded text messages, even these systems have limits. Today, carriers need a lot more than just a relatively slow, secure means of receiving words. This problem surfaced with particular impact during Desert Storm, when none of the U.S. Navy carriers had the ability to receive the daily Air Tasking Order (ATO) from CENTCOM's air command in Riyadh. Every other air unit in the theater, including those of our allies, could get the ATO (which ran to hundreds of pages of densely formatted text), even if only by high-speed FAX machines over secure phone lines. But the Navy, having always planned on fighting on their own in the open ocean, was ill prepared for the communications required for joint operations with other services. As a result, the Navy did not receive its daily delivery of the ATO by high-tech satellite or data link, but by hand-delivered paper copies flown in by an S-3 Viking. As might be imagined, this was quite an embarrassment for the Navy, and as a result it began to put together systems to relieve this lack of joint connectivity.

The first try at a solution to the problem was known as the "Challenge Athena" experiment. Challenge Athena I-initially an experimental system on board the USS George Washington (CVN-73)-is a two-way, low-speed (around 768 kilobytes per second-kps) satellite link based upon commercial antenna technology. Originally developed for use in delivering intelligence photos and conducting video teleconferences, it has grown into a much broader communications system, and in the process has become incredibly popular with everyone in the fleet. Along with the obvious benefits to top planners and commanders, Challenge Athena provides the crew not only with two-way E-mail contact home, but also with direct live access to commercial television channels like CNN and ESPN. A new high-speed version of the system, Challenge Athena III, is about to be installed throughout the carrier force, as well as on fleet flagships, big-deck amphibious ships, and perhaps even major combatants like the Aegis cruisers and destroyers. A comparable system is being developed for use by submarines, to support Tomahawk cruise-missile targeting, special operations, and unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) missions. The domed Challenge Athena antennas are located on the flight deck level, outboard of the island and the crotch.

Now it is time to go below. After a drop down a stack of six ladders from the bridge, we find ourselves on the 03 or "Gallery" level, directly under the flight deck. Heading inboard, we find two central passageways running the length of the full ship. Almost a quarter-mile long, these passageways seem to go on forever, with only an occasional cross-passageway to break the monotony of "knee knockers" and watertight hatches. Most of what we see here are doors, lots of them, behind some of which are the real "brains" of the ship-the various command, air wing, and squadron spaces. In addition, most of the air wing officers and flag staff personnel live here. If you turn left and head aft down the main starboard passageway, you pass compartments filled with the hydraulic cylinders for the arresting-gear system. These are gigantic, filling the space between the two main corridors. The compartments here are also even more spotlessly clean than the rest of the ship, since one of the first signs of trouble in a hydraulic system is telltale leaks of fluid.

Farther aft are many of the squadron ready rooms. These large spaces are the headquarters for the various flying squadrons and detachments attached to the carrier's embarked air wing. The ready room is the inner sanctum of a flying squadron, a combination of clubhouse, rest area, and meeting/ briefing/planning center. Since the rules of naval aviation allow a freedom of speech and expression that would not be tolerated in other areas aboard ship, ready rooms are extremely private places (where life as a naval aviator is seen at its most raw and splendid). This means that they are for aviators and only aviators, and permission is required before anyone else is allowed inside.

Ready rooms are wondrous places, filled with historic photos, trophies, and plaques from the unit's past. At the front of the ready room is the desk for the squadron duty officer and a large white board for briefings and discussions. There also are rows of the most comfortable chairs you will ever sit in. Based on a design that predates the Second World War, they are soft but firm, with thick leather covers embossed with the squadron's colors and logo. They can also recline for a short nap between sorties, and have fold-down writing tables for scribbling notes.

At the rear of the room is a small enclosed area where the terminal for the Tactical Aircrew Mission Planning System (TAMPS) is located. TAMPS is an automated system that allows air crews to perform route and mission planning. Since it can take into account effects like terrain masking and enemy air defense weapons envelopes, TAMPS is a major improvement over the old system of paper maps, photos, and air crew intuition. After each squadron does their planning over the networked TAMPS system, the staff of the air wing can review an entire strike/mission plan before the mission is flown.

After leaving the ready room, we'll head forward. After we've passed through about a third of the ship, the tile changes from normal Navy gray to a bright blue, meaning that we have reached what the crew calls "blue tile country." This is the central command and control complex for both the ship and the carrier battle group. The deck in "blue tile country" is subdivided into a series of spaces, each dedicated to a different set of warfare tasks. These include:

• Combat Information Center (CIC)-This is the battle nerve center of the ship, with displays for all of the ship's sensors, as well as information acquired from data links and national sources (the DoD term for reconnaissance satellites, aircraft, and other systems). The CIC is specifically designed to present all the available data on the combat situation to the officers making the decisions about how to "fight" the ship. Filled with consoles, terminals, and big-screen displays, this space has separate zones for antisub, antiair, and antisurface warfare, communications, damage control, and other functions. Back in World War II a captain normally fought his ship from the bridge, but today's Arleigh Burke or Phillip Vian will normally be found at a glowing console within a dimly lit CIC. Aircraft carriers' CICs are somewhat different from those of other ships. On a carrier, not all of the terminals and personnel are in a single room, as they are on an Aegis cruiser or destroyer. This better hardens the ship against attack, and avoids a huge and overmanned space, which could be destroyed by a single hit. Thus, the various warfare specialties-antiair (AAW), antisubmarine (ASW), antisurface (ASUW), etc.-have their own small control centers, which forward their data into the main CIC.

• Carrier Air Traffic Control Center (CATCC)-The CATCC is a control center for handling airspace and traffic control around the battle group. This one is different from a local FAA control center, in that it moves with the ship and has the ability to data-link information from offboard sensor systems like Aegis ships and AEW aircraft (E-2Cs, E-3's, etc.).

• Tactical Flag Command Center-The TFCC is essentially a duplicate in miniature of the CIC. The difference is that the TFCC is specially configured to maximize access to data that flag officers (i.e., admirals/ battle group commanders) need. To support this requirement, the TFCC was developed with the same kinds of large-screen displays and workstations that you would find aboard the Aegis ships that screen the carrier. (The TFCC used to be called "Flag Plot," but that space now resides up on the island.)

• Joint Intelligence Center (JIC)-The Joint Intelligence Center is a clearinghouse for information required by the ship, the battle group, and embarked air units. Analysts in the JIC can draw from vast databases of National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA) maps, satellite photography, and anything else the intelligence community provides. The JIC staff is a "rainbow" organization from every unit in the battle group, as well as from other services and intelligence organizations. Even better, they can probably tell you what it all means.

• Ships Signals Exploitation Space (SSES)-This small sealed space is for the really secret stuff: "exploitation" of enemy radio signals and electronic emissions. Equipped with data links to national and theater-level intelligence systems, the SSES can provide battle group leaders with up-to-date information on enemy intentions and activities. Only specially cleared intelligence and communications technicians are allowed inside.

Normally, these are all quiet places manned by a small staff working in shifts. But when an operation or exercise is under way, they resemble a darkened beehive without the buzz, everyone working around the clock until the exercise is finished. By the way, it's really cold there, due to the vast amounts of air-conditioning and chill water needed to keep all the electronics and computers from literally melting down. Even in the dog days of August, you often find console operators and other watch-standers wearing wind-breakers and pullover sweaters to keep the chill out of their bones.

Forward of the command spaces are the flag quarters, where the battle group commander and his staff live. If any place on a carrier can be called luxurious, this is it. There is fine furniture and wood paneling, a large mess and briefing area, a private galley, and the admiral's stateroom, office, and head. Comfortable and functional, all of these spaces are within a few seconds walk of the TFCC. Its comfort notwithstanding, nobody I know likes working in the flag quarters. That is because the flag spaces are directly under the launch shuttle and JBD for Catapult Number 1. The noise during deck operations is deafening, and living and working here during round-the-clock flight operations is downright unpleasant. Such things in fact rarely bother the admiral and staff personnel, however, since they don't get that much sleep anyway. The demands of running a battle group mean that if they are getting more than six hours of sleep every day, they are probably not working hard enough! By a strange irony, the nicer the quarters, the less time an occupant gets to spend in them. While rank and responsibility bring physical rewards, most senior officers rarely have the free time while aboard to enjoy them.

Moving forward again, we find more ready rooms, as well as dozens of staterooms for the air wing personnel and ship's officers. Most of these are two-man units, and are actually quite pleasant to live in (as I did for several days). The racks are doubled-decked, and somewhat larger than those of the enlisted personnel. There is a fair amount of personal stowage space, as well as a small fold-down desk. Each officer has a safe for classified materials and personal items, as well as a small sink and mirror. Though a few staterooms have shared heads and shower facilities, most officers use one of the many community head/shower spaces around the ship. Roommates also usually go in together on electronic items like a "boom box" stereo, television, and VCR; and there is a box for plugging these into the ship's cable television and radio network, as well as the commercial feeds from the Challenge Athena system.

Forward of the living spaces, there is a truly wonderful place, called the "Dirty Shirt" galley and wardroom area. This is the only officers' wardroom aboard where wearing flight suits and flight deck work gear is "acceptable." While the other wardrooms belong to the ship, the "Dirty Shirt" wardroom "belongs" to the air wing, which means that aviator traditions apply here. "Dirty Shirt" menus tend to be more informal, and talking "shop" is allowable. Each squadron has its own table, and etiquette dictates that you ask permission to join anyone who is already there. Still, more often than not, you will find a warm smile and an invitation to join the conversation. In the "Dirty Shirt" mess there is also is a neat, little-known secret: the "dog" machine-the nickname for the soft-serve ice cream dispenser, which is kept going around the clock.[41] It is a wonderful diversion from the sometimes-spartan life aboard ship; and the "Dirty Shirt's" dog machine is usually the best on the ship.

Heading aft, about two-thirds of the way back, we come to a cross-corridor intersection with what looks like a small store on each corner. These are the various squadron "shops" for the flying units of the air wing, with one such space for every squadron in the air wing. Here all the data on the readiness, flying and maintenance status, and ordinance/stores loadouts of every squadron's aircraft is managed. Here also is where the Command Master Chief (CMC) for each squadron works. The CMC is the senior enlisted sailor in each squadron, and functions as the shop foreman who keeps the aircraft ready to fly and fight. The CMC also functions as an advisor and advocate for the enlisted personnel of the squadron to the unit's officers. Along with the entire corps of petty officers, the CMCs are the institutional "glue" of the Navy, and a good officer rapidly learns this fact. Finally, they are the keepers of the "Squadron Store." This sells coffee mugs, T-shirts, patches, and stickers of the squadron logo (called "zaps"). If you get aboard a carrier, be sure to pick up a few of these, since the money always goes into the squadron relief fund. I always do.

Returning aft to the island ladder well, we head down four more levels to the Second Deck (deck levels above the hangar or main deck have numbers-01, 02, etc.-while decks below are spelled out). Here most of the crew (officers and enlisted personnel) take their meals. Both have galley and eating facilities here, and something like fifteen thousand meals a day are served on this deck alone. The enlisted personnel eat cafeteria-style in three large spaces amidships that can hold about five hundred personnel at a time. The officers' wardroom (called "Number Three") is farther aft, and is essentially a sit-down-style restaurant, though there's a buffet line if you desire. Always open, Wardroom Three is the social center of the ship. Here the officers can come together for a few minutes and share news of the day with their shipmates. Coffee, "bug juice" (the Navy version of "Kool Aid"), and nacho machines are always powered up, and you can usually beg a meal from the mess stewards if you look as though you've worked hard enough. There even is what is jokingly known as the "nuclear-powered cappuccino machine," which dispenses a passable cup of that delicious brew.

Surrounding the officers' wardroom on the Second Deck are the state-rooms for most of the ship's senior officers and department heads. Like the flag quarters on the 02 level, these are very pleasant, with private offices and head/shower facilities. Also like flag quarters, they are used very little since there is very little time for sleep and relaxation while aboard a nuclear supercarrier. Aft of the wardroom are more enlisted quarters. These are much like the ones we've already visited, except that flight deck sounds are muffled by the mass of the ship; and you'll probably hear and feel instead the ship's engineering plant. At high speeds (over twenty-five knots), when the hull begins to resonate, the background buzz can be annoying. Another annoyance is the heat on the lower decks when the ship passes through warm water like the Gulf Stream or Persian Gulf. Things can get downright steamy under some conditions.

Dropping down another ladder, you come upon the machinery spaces on the Third Deck, where most of the systems that keep the ship "alive" are contained. Here and on the deck below are machine shops, electrical switchboards and emergency diesel generators, the ship's laundry, medical and dental facilities, and the air-conditioning plant. Also on the Third Deck is the ship's store, the post office (a surprisingly large facility), and the newly installed banks of satellite phones. These allow sailors to call home from anywhere in the world for about a dollar a minute, and make a real difference in the lives of the crew.

Below the Fourth Deck are the heavily protected and restricted spaces dedicated to the nuclear reactors, propulsion machinery, ammunition magazines, and pump rooms. Surrounded by a double hull with massive voids (specially designed buffer zones to absorb explosions) as protection against damage, these are the safest and most secure areas of the ship. Due to the security restrictions placed upon the Navy by the Department of Energy and the Director of Naval Reactors (NAVSEA 08), I'm not able to describe their layout or equipment.[42] I can say, however, that the two Westinghouse A4W reactors provide enough saturated steam to run the ship at thirty-plus knots while leaving enough electricity to power all the ship's other systems com-fortably.The four General Electric steam turbines put out 280,000 shp to four shafts, and are highly agile at starting and stopping.

With the tour at an end, we drag our weary bones and joints up to the hangar deck, and walk over to the accommodation ladder back to the dock. By now you have a pretty good idea of the layout of today's Nimitz-class carriers. However, the four-decade production run of this design is starting to wind down, and new ideas are beginning to be put forth for a new generation of flattop. Read on, and I'll try and give you some ideas about what they will look like.

The Future: CVN-77 and CVX-78

The Nimitz-class carriers are as capable as their designers and builders could manage back in the late 1960's, representing an almost optimum mix of capabilities for operations during the Cold War. Yet SCB-102 is a design in its third decade of continuous production, the Cold War is now history, and it is time to think about a replacement after the Ronald Reagan is launched in a few years. That is exactly what the Navy is doing. The U.S. Navy will always have the mission of projecting forward presence with a regular cycle of carrier rotations. At the same time, the Navy also foresees dealing more frequently with irregular, unpredictable situations. And finally, there is the necessary requirement to keep costs of building, operating, and maintaining carriers reasonable.

Question: How can the Navy do all that?

Answer: Accept the fact that is it time for a new direction in flattop design and construction.

To do this, NNS founded a carrier "Skunk Works" called the Carrier Innovation Center, based a stone's throw from Dry Dock 12 at Newport News. Here the NNS design engineers are studying ways to build carriers that will be more suited to the operations the post-Cold War will bring. Working in concert with a number of other corporate partners, as well as NAVSEA, NNS has helped the Navy form a two-step plan for taking carrier construction and sea-based Naval aviation into the 21st century.

Phase one of the plan involves the building of one additional Nimitz-class carrier after the USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76), which is now under construction. This unnamed carrier, known today as CVN-77, will be a Nimitz only under the skin. Current plans have CVN-77 utilizing a basic Nimitz power plant and hull structure up to the main deck level, but from there on up everything else will be new. CVN-77 will be used as a technological "bridge" ship where a number of new technologies and ideas will be tried out. While some of these technologies have yet to be fully defined, most have already been inserted into the mass of requirements documents being produced at NAVSEA. They include:

• Signature Reduction-This is stealth technology, or more accurately "low observables." Can anyone actually hide a quarter-mile-long monster from modern sensor systems? The answer is "yes," but with qualifications. You have to remember that an object's radar, thermal, electronic, and acoustic signature has very little to do with its actual size. Shaping, materials, and other engineering details have much more to do with these characteristics. By way of example, an expert I spoke with claimed that a 90 % reduction in the radar cross section of a carrier could be achieved through relatively minor, though detailed, changes to the ship's island; sponsion, and deck structures. This would mean that a Nimitz-sized ship might be given a radar signature smaller than a guided-missile frigate's. Already, outstanding signature reduction work has been done on Arleigh Burke-class (DDG-51) Aegis destroyers, which are extremely tough to see on radar and infrared sensors.

• Automation/Reduced Manning-A key Navy initiative is to reduce manning aboard ships (primarily as a cost-saving measure). With over 70 % of every defense dollar going to personnel costs, the Navy figures it can save over $50,000 per year for every sailor who can be eliminated or replaced by automation. According to current plans, CVN-77 will implement many of the "Smart Ship" systems that are being tried out on the USS Yorktown (CG-47). These systems have already reduced the size of the Yorktown's crew by 15 %. The Navy has even greater goals for CVN-77, and a cut of from 25 % to 33 % is considered possible. This could mean a reduction of up to one thousand personnel from the ship's company, and a savings of over $50 million a year over a "standard" Nimitz. That translates into some $2.5 billion during the fifty-year service life of CVN-77.

• Adaptive Mission Features-CVN-77 will be capable of rapid reconfiguration for missions other than those traditionally associated with "big deck" aircraft carriers. Operations "short-of-war" and disaster/humanitarian relief missions are becoming the rule rather than the exception. To this end, the Navy has decided to redesign the interior spaces of CVN-77 to provide more adaptability. The changes include air wing enlisted berthing areas with the kinds of personal stowage (weapons, ammunition, etc.) required by Marines or other ground personnel who might go into ground combat. Likewise, air wing planning, control, and unit spaces will be more capable for joint operations, so that units like Army helicopter battalions or special operations forces could use them with a minimum of modification. Finally, the hangar bays and elevators are being redesigned to increase aircraft options, so that tilt-rotor aircraft, UAVs, and even the planned new generation of unmanned combat aerial vehicles-UCAVs-can be carried and operated. One senior Naval analyst has even suggested the inclusion of a "Roll-On, Roll-Off" (Ro-Ro) ramp on the fantail for loading of vehicles and cargo. All of this adds up to a carrier with more capability and variety than any ever built.

• Process/Work Flow Improvements-NNS has made a formal review of the jobs done on board a carrier in order to identify key areas where "process improvements" can be implemented into the CVN-77 design. NNS is looking at what is called a flight deck "pit stop." There the crews servicing aircraft or waiting to launch could do so under shelter from the elements. Performing more flight deck functions in the hangar deck (arming, fueling, etc.) would also reduce the wear and tear on both personnel and equipment. And several tasks like ordnance loading (for very strong backs) and critical movement paths through the ship for supplies and personnel will be automated. This would eliminate the many "bucket brigades" of sailors moving supplies through the corridors. There is even some consideration of putting a "ski jump" on the bow to enhance the launching of the new generation of carrier aircraft, which might eliminate the need for catapults.

• Materials Improvements-A wide variety of new materials are being considered for inclusion in the CVN-77 design. Heat-resistant silica tiles should allow the jet blast deflectors to dispense with the traditional water-cooling system. A new lightweight blown fiber-optical local area network (LAN) cabling will increase the speed and capacity of the ship's data network by up to 100,000 times. Composites for interior and topside structures (to reduce weight) and radar-absorbing materials (RAM-to assist in signature reduction) will also make their debut on CVN-77. Hull paints and non-skid coatings with vastly expanded service lives (measured in years instead of months) are also being developed, and all of these substances will be more environmentally "friendly." Finally, with an eye to the day in the middle of the 21st Century when CVN-77 will itself go to the scrap yard, a master material list will be prepared, so that whoever takes it apart will know what to be careful with. The Navy is still having nightmares removing asbestos lagging (insulation) aboard ships built before the EPA banned the stuff. The master materials list should put an end to such problems.

• Weapons-While the Mk. 29 Sea Sparrow launchers and Mk. 16 Phalanx have provided adequate point defense to past Nimitz-class carriers, it is likely that CVN-77 will be equipped with more potent armament. Following the lead forged by the new San Antonio-class (LPD-17) amphibious dock ships, CVN-77 will probably be equipped with several clusters of Mk. 41 VLS systems, suitable for launching the Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (ESSM) that is being developed as a follow-on to the RIM-7M Sea Sparrow SAM. Each eight-cell Mk. 41 module (which can be clustered with up to seven additional modules to build a 64-cell missile launcher) can carry up to four ESSM rounds per cell. Since the Mk. 41 launcher can also launch other weapons (like the BGM-109 Tomahawk cruise missile), you might see quite a few VLS cells scattered about the deck edges of the CVN-77. Also expect that three or four 21-round Mk. 49 launchers for RIM-116 point defense SAMs will be there as well. RAM is rapidly replacing the old Mk. 15 20mm Phalanx CIWS aboard Navy warships, and it is likely that CVN-77 will be equipped with RAM from the start.

• Data/Electronic Systems-Though computer-based systems are used aboard warships for everything from propulsion control to sending E-mail home, warship designers did not actually take the digital revolution into account until fairly recently. The technology of personal computers, networks, and workstations has moved so quickly that equipment and technologies in NAVSEA ship specifications are usually obsolete before they go out for contract. NNS is therefore recommending that the Navy "open" the specification for the data, electronic, and electrical systems to include what is known as commercial, off-the-shelf (COTS) technologies, and to specify performance beyond anything currently in production. For example, the fiber optical LAN currently installed in the USS George Washington (CVN-73) is a 10-BaseT/T-1-style system, with data-transfer rates of around ten megabytes (MB) per second. For the CVN-77 design, NNS is thinking about a shipboard LAN with data-transfer rates in the terabit (TB-that is, 1,000,000 MB)-per-second range. Though specifying a LAN with a capacity 100,000 times greater than the one aboard ships today may sound absurd, it makes perfect sense if you consider that computer and LAN technology is doubling in speed and capacity every eighteen months. By allowing commercial-style equipment and software aboard ship (such as using Windows NT as a shipboard-wide operating system), costs are reduced and the crew will be given equipment that is as up to date as government procurement can make it. Finally, NNS will try to use COTS systems in the future wherever a military-specification, custom-built electronic system might be used now.

• Zonal Electrical Distribution Systems-While the computer/electronics revolution is generally a good thing, you still have to power all this new stuff. Unbelievable as it may seem, all of the laptop computers, televisions, VCRs, and personal stereo equipment aboard ship are now causing significant electrical problems for carriers. Even though a nuclear power plant gives you enough electrical power to light a small city, you still have to effectively distribute all that power to where it is required, when it is needed, without overloading the power-distribution system. To do this, the Navy and NNS want to install what is known as Zonal Electrical Distribution Systems. Using this system, for example, the ship's systems involved with daytime operations (in offices and work spaces like laundry and galley facilities) can be powered when they are most active, and isolated when they are idle. Zonal Distribution will also improve damage-control capabilities because of increased system redundancy.

• Communications Systems-Ever since Desert Storm pointed out its relative isolation, the USN has been trying to catch up with the other services in communications technology. Although the Challenge Athena system is a good start, it lacks both the reliability and bandwidth (i.e., data-flow capacity) to handle the volume of data required in a major war. Further, the need for additional bandwidth, especially in the satellite frequencies, has been growing almost as fast as the speed and power of computer/ LAN technology. Therefore, CVN-77 will have a communications capacity far beyond that of current ships. In particular, the new high-speed satellite systems preferred by the regional CinCs will be emphasized, as well as secure data-link systems for distribution to other ships in the battle group.

All of these features will make CVN-77 the most powerful and capable aircraft carrier ever built. Though it will be a Nimitz in the hull and propulsion systems, it will be totally new in almost every other way. Though the schedule for CVN-77 is based upon funding dates that will be controlled by a President and Congress that have not yet been elected, current plans have the ship funded in FY-2001, with delivery in Fiscal Year 2008 (it is planned to replace USS Kitty Hawk (CV-63)).

The second element in the Navy's carrier production plan is currently known as CVX (Aircraft Carrier-Experimental), which will be the lead ship of a new class of carriers, the first in almost a half century. The program, which will hopefully deliver its first ship in FY-2013, is designed to incorporate all of the "bridge" technologies from CVN-77, as well as some other improvements that will be possible because of the new hull and power plant that will be part of the design. Some of these new features will include:

• Hull Design-The hull form of the CVX is still under study, though it will probably be a traditional monohull design. It is likely that the CVX will displace something more than the 95,000 tons of the Nimitz-class carriers. What the ship will actually look like, however, is anyone's guess.

• Propulsion/Power Plant-If there is any sticking point in the design of the CVX-class carriers, it will be over the question of the power plant. Though powerful arguments against nuclear-powered warships remain, for all its vices (such as cost and environmental concerns), nuclear power provides real benefits for the captains and crews of aircraft carriers, and this means that any change had better offer significantly greater benefits. In order to resolve this question, NNS has been conducting a power plant study for CVX at their Carrier Innovation Center. There they are looking at gas turbines, turbine-electric motors, marine diesels, fossil-fueled boilers, and nuclear power as candidate CVX power plants. While the study is still in the early stages, don't be surprised if nuclear power winds up the winner. Steam turbines are a highly compact and efficient means of powering large warships, and nuclear reactors are more compact and efficient than boilers for producing that steam.

• Weapons-CVX will probably have a mix of Mk. 41 and 49 launchers very like CVN-77's. However, laser weaponry is advancing so fast that the first CVX or some of its sister ships may well be equipped with a first-generation laser CIWS. The Air Force will deploy a similar system aboard a modified Boeing 747–400 in a few years, and a shipboard system would probably be a highly effective counter to the new generation of supersonic antiship weapons now being deployed around the world.

• Catapults-Though for over a half century steam catapults have been successfully shooting aircraft off carriers, they nevertheless have significant drawbacks. For one thing, the high-pressure steam lines that power the catapults are complex and take up a lot of internal volume. For another, the saturated steam they carry is vicious stuff if a line cracks or breaks or is damaged. Finally, if a leak develops or the pressure is incorrectly set, steam catapults will occasionally "cold shoot" aircraft into the water. All of these problems have led to a major CVX initiative to replace the old steam units with a catapult using another technology. For instance, the electromagnetic technology that was to be used on the rail guns being designed for the Strategic Defense Initiative back in the 1980s might well work on carriers. However, an internal-combustion technology looks like a better prospect. Here jet fuel would power a contained fuel-air detonation in a piston to fire the aircraft on its way. Internal-combustion catapults are simple and reliable in concept, and could use the existing jet fuel system on the flight deck.

• Automated Weapons Handling-Since weapons stowage, movement, buildup, loading, and arming eat up an enormous portion of a carrier's personnel, a high priority in the CVX design is to automate the weapons handling and loading on future aircraft carriers. One idea already under consideration involves using an unpowered, but human-controlled, bomb cart and loader that makes clever use of counterweights and levers to upload even the largest pieces of Navy ordnance. Other ideas include robotic inventory/handling control of weapons in the magazines.

• Advanced Flight/Hangar Deck Management-One of the Navy's biggest challenges is to improve the efficiency of operations on the flight and hangar decks. Specifically, they want to reduce the number of personnel involved in operations on the flight/hangar decks, to improve the quality of the work environment, and to increase the rate of sortie generation for the embarked air wing. Along with the "pit stop" systems planned for use on CVN-77, robotic servicing equipment will probably be used for fueling, arming, aircraft handling/positioning, and for monitoring systems.

If the CVX-78 program manages to stay on track, the first ship of the class will be commissioned sometime in 2013, and a second unit will probably be added to the fleet about four or five years later. Beyond that, it's anybody's guess. We're talking about aircraft carriers that will be operating in a world fifty years from now. What will the world and the military balance of 2050 look like? I wish I knew. But if the people at NNS and NAVSEA have done their homework, the carriers being built and planned today will provide useful platforms to base the combat aircraft of tomorrow well past the halfway mark of the 21st century.