General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: china lands first jet on it's aircraft carrier [View all]cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)So they landed a plane on a boat, with an empty deck, in calm seas. Maybe. Given the Chinese reputation for dishonesty, I'm gonna say "video, or it didn't happen". I wouldn't doubt for a minute that the Chinese sent the ship to sea with that J-15 in the hangar bay.
Carrier ops require soooo much more than simply landing a plane on an empty deck in calm seas; it's almost hard to conceive. Night ops. Bad weather ops. UNREP (underway replenishment). VERTREP (vertical replenishment). The real trick is doing all of those things with a full compliment of aircraft onboard. Those are just SOME of the things that have to be mastered in order to become an efficient carrier battle group. They're also things the US mastered over 50 years ago.
Imagine a 1100 foot long ship next to an 800 foot long ship, less than 100 feet apart while traveling around 20 mph. As if that feat isn't in itself seemingly impossible, imagine the two ships being connected by steel cables and hoses and transferring fuel, food, weapons, parts, mail, etc. for a few hours with NO MISTAKES. Make mistakes in that situation and people will die.
Yeah. Have them call us when they've had the experience of landing 10-15 aircraft on a pitching deck at night in the rain while being too far away from the nearest shore based landing strip to send a plane to if something goes wrong.
This isn't worrisome in the slightest...