A hugely expensive white elephant.
I have to laugh. Described by the Russians as a 'Large convenient target'.
I'd say so.
You could probably hit it from Mars !!
Brendan
A hugely expensive white elephant.
I have to laugh. Described by the Russians as a 'Large convenient target'.
I'd say so.
You could probably hit it from Mars !!
Brendan
Yep, quite sure they will just leave it sat out there with a large target on it and no means to defend itself.
Repeating unfriendly sneers designed to lower national morale doesn't seem very patriotic
Sorry, mine should have been in green font.Originally Posted by Der Amf
Come on !!!
You gotta laugh !!
Self depracation is a very British illness Der Amf !
Brendan
The captain of a US super carrier - maybe the Theodore Roosevelt, can't remember which one - did say he wondered why the Royal Navy had no carriers (after the decommissioning of the Ark Royal), as he reckoned if he, i.e. his ship, had been involved in the Falklands War it would have been over in a day.
Built it, and am building the 2nd one now.
Very high tech ship, much more advanced than any other carriers out there.
I don't think we can afford it however.
Government tried to cancel the 2nd one but it was too late.
FYI Parts of the "Trident II" are being built in the same location, not seen anything of them though.
Like patriotic is góód!!
In reply to the first comment, interesting from the Russians who recently had a lot of publicity for sending their aircraft carrier through the Channel to the Med to project air power off the coast of Syria.
The ship itself is superb, with a great aircraft coming to operate off it. The real question is do we need one in today's world? What are our armed forces for? Protection of the UK or a way to try and stay a 'world power' and maintain influence off the back of it?
Similar question for Trident replacement.
I think the comment about the aircraft is open to debate and indeed has been debated at extreme length on this very forum. Unless you mean the Merlin which is pretty good I guess.
Maybe if the French borrow the second ship (POW) and find a way to fly Rafales off her we might be able to borrow it back now and then.
Patriotism is not the same as nationalism. Seems nowadays that most people don't recognise that.
Just wait until we spend considerably more on nuclear submarines the Americans command...
At least an aircraft carrier has plenty of practical uses...
M
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Breitling Cosmonaute 809 - What's not to like?
May God bless her and all who sail in her.
Have we any aircraft for her?
Don’t be ridiculous!
'Against stupidity, the gods themselves struggle in vain' - Schiller.
It’s pointless anyway all the sailors are guarding Buckingham palace so who’s going to crew it?Don’t be ridiculous!
The army’s down to about 10 men and the RAFs sulking because they aren’t the senior service.
All in all things aren’t looking so good.
We have 14 F-35Bs that could fly off her currently. Not many pilots yet though...
Exactly so!
Exactly so!
Aye, my pals son is on that ship.
maseman
I think it's a great shame we retired our Harriers and Sea Harriers - we could have had them ready to operate from the Queen Elizabeth right now rather than waiting years for aircraft to put on it.
So clever my foot fell off.
Indeed.
^^^First this.May God bless her and all who sail in her
I once saw the Ark Royal and last year I spotted the Charles de Gaulle in Toulon. I was (and am) seriously impressed by the sight.
When I was a little lad, my father took me to the wharf where the HMS Vengeance was transformed into the Brasilian Minas Gerais. On deck, they tested the steam-powered catapults. His workshop and crew had built the steam system: boilers, pipes, valves. They used truck chassis with a pontoon (floating device) were ejected from the deck into the harbour with the steam catapult. There were 5 or 6 of these pontoons on the deck or in the water at the same time. Not really high tech at the time but it made a life-long impression on me!
Menno
Last edited by thieuster; 8th December 2017 at 07:49.
You’re quite right about the way that catapults were tested. Many years ago the MoD sold one of our carriers to the Indian Navy. Before its sale it was overhauled by Harland and Wolf in Belfast. It was just at the time that The City Council was disposing of the tram system in Belfast. The old trams were bought up cheaply and used for catapult testing as the ship transited back to India.
I have often imagined that in hundreds of years time marine archaeologists will discover Belfast trams littering the sea bed of the Indian Ocean and wondered what conclusions they would draw.
Yes agreed,That should have been my first reaction.
I went to Malta this year, to visit the museums etc. looking into the Malta convoys.
My grandfather helped form the convoys escorting the merchant ships to Gibraltar for the run in to Malta.
My mother had found his Navy record when she moved house which helped me trace what he had done in WW2 and before.
At one stage I ended up on a harbour tour with an old German couple who kept mentioning the war and the convoys.
Last edited by bwest76; 8th December 2017 at 07:47.
This ^ notwithstanding of what you think of the ongoing cuts, procurement and SDSR shenanigans.
Fas est ab hoste doceri
Hear, Hear. If the defence budget hadn’t had a £34 billion hole in it when this mess had to be sorted out we’d be in a lot better shape now.
Fantastic vessel, when the aircraft deploy she’ll be world class.
We are already spending on the subs.
Genuinely interested here, why do you think our subs are under US command or control?
I meant the replacements that are long overdue.
M
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Breitling Cosmonaute 809 - What's not to like?
So you mean Dreadnought class will be under control of the US?
I watched a news documentary a couple of years ago where they stated that the Polaris nuclear subs relied totally on American targeting technology and systems - i.e. without the Yanks, the cruise missiles would not be able to hit anything.
Somewhere to temporarily park containers waiting to enter post Brexit Britain?
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Sorry but this is nonsense. The USA has no operational input into the RN submarine flotilla except very occasionally when operating under a NATO umbrella.
I assume you are referring to the much quoted US control of the Trident missile system. This is largely misunderstood by the media. The USA provides the missiles and the launch systems - but not the warheads. The USA has no operational control of the system thereafter - and theoretically the UK could launch the missiles independently.
P.S. I worked in the UK nuclear submarine industry for 45 years including 15 years as a RN submariner. I was also ( briefly) the Commissioning Director on the QEC Carrier project.
Lovely - I'm not getting into a political argument in G&D, let's just say I don't dispute the theory of what you say one bit.
M
Like every other carrier on the planet, that's why they're protected by carrier groups.
Not sure that we need it at all but my only observation on seeing it was "it's a bit smaller than the competition '. 😁
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An aircraft carrier is a smaller target than any RAF airbase, which has the added convenience of being stationary and in a known position.
Ah but a land base can't be sunk by a submarine, against which we now have very little defence or even detection capability. Basically these days we are a tin pot piss poor Navy*. Our politicians need a good kick up the arse like they got in 1982 but they forgot that lesson all too quickly.
* Can I say that in G&D or should I redact?
Last edited by Padders; 9th December 2017 at 22:11.
Great ship, good news for the navy I think. Once operational will make a great base for operations.
Three cheers for the Senior Service.
Normal snag, easily rectified. I am sure there are many others, and more will be discovered in the coming weeks. Nothing unusual.
'Against stupidity, the gods themselves struggle in vain' - Schiller.
...." I name this ship Queen Eleakybeth, may God bless her and all who drown on her..."
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It’s going to need fixing?
It will cost millions?
It will be FoC to RN because BAE & sub-contractors will be picking up full costs?
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Whenever we talk about who will be picking up the costs for fixing snags like this, it’s worth remembering the cost estimate for each carrier has risen from £1.5Bn in 2007 to £3.1Bn at completion.
So, FoC is probably a stretch!
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