February 1955: USS Forrestal

The program to deliver the US Navy’s next generation of aircraft carrier is well underway with the most recent Ford-class carrier – USS John F. Kennedy – ready for final completion and outfitting.

The 10 Ford-class carriers on order will replace USS Enterprise, which was the world’s first nuclear-powered carrier, and Nimitz-class carriers that have been in service since USS Nimitz entered service in 1975.

With a ship’s company of between 3000-3,200 and able to embark over 60 aircraft (and 1,500 air wing personnel), the Nimitz-class carriers were designed to have a service life of 50-years with the requirement for a single mid-life refuelling.

The Ford-class will embark over 75 aircraft but will operate with fewer crew members, saving US taxpayers almost $4bn over its 50-year service life.

November 1962 - The birth of Maglev

October 1954 - the flying bedstead

A shared feature of these vessels is the canted – or angled - flight deck and the first to introduce this innovation to the US Navy was USS Forrestal, a surface ship acknowledged as being the world’s first supercarrier that was launched at the yard of Newport News Shipbuilding, Virginia, on December 11th, 1954 and covered by The Engineer the following February.