China Carrier Preps for Flight Ops?

The Diplomat ^ | March 19, 2012 | David Axe

[sukhoi-30mki]

China Carrier Preps for Flight Ops?

Photos posted to the Internet in China last week seem to confirm that the Chinese Navy has installed arrestor gear and other vital equipment on its refurbished Soviet-made aircraft carrier, the ex-Varyag. If genuine, the installations could represent a big step forward for the first-ever seaborne, fixed-wing aviation capability for the People's Liberation Army Navy.

One image appears to show a traditional four-wire arrangement on the aft flight deck of the roughly 1,000-foot-long carrier. Another depicts a small tractor of the type used to move aircraft around the deck.

The ex-Varyag, which was speculated to have been renamed the Shi Lang in Chinese service, underwent more than a decade of rework in Dalian shipyard following her acquisition from Russia in the late 1990s. She conducted her first sea trial in July and performed a second, brief, at-sea test in November. These tests didn't include fixed-wing aircraft. Indeed, much of the equipment necessary to support airplanes apparently had apparently not been installed.

In December, a Chinese government spokesman denied rumors that Russia had refused to sell China arresting gear. The ex-Varyag's deck equipment was being developed indigenously, the spokesman said.

The wires and the tractor should allow the ex-Varyag to begin flight trials with navalized J-15 fighters as early as this spring – assuming, of course, that other requisite gear has also been installed, including air-traffic-control radars, communications, aircraft fueling and repair facilities.

Even with all that equipment in place, it could take years for China to train aviators and deck crew to safely and efficiently launch, recover and maintain carrier-based aircraft. Coo

[DesertRhino]

“Without firing a shot the US fleet is shrinking, while China slowly builds up hers.”

Perfectly astated. A slow financial war,,, with the same ultimate effect as a shooting war. And even more ironic,, is that they are more capitalist driven than we are,,, and we are becoming socialist central planners who won’t build dams, bridges, or pipelines. We won’t mine our minerals.
Our national suicide is growing. All any would be adversary should do,, is act halfway friendly, and be patient.

[MtBaldy]

“KP not look so bad now”

I don't think that can be real or at least they're not shooting at it with real guns. That's a simple wooden fence behind him with what looks to be a street and stores on the other side of it. Even in China if random civilians were getting shot while simply going about their daily business there would be a stink.

Also, while I would never do it, the soldier holding the target would be relatively safe if I was shooting at it with my scoped Marlin Model 60 .22. I can put 10 shots in a group little bigger than 1” at 25 yards and not much bigger than that at 50 yards.

[DesertRhino]

“They’ll just replace the planes with new ones. Same thing with the flight deck if needed. Why shouldn’t they? We’re paying for them.”

Yes,,, but the Forrestal accident and similar ones required more than just a new compliment of airframes and a few replacement sailors being brought aboard. Loss of a damaged carrier for weeks, or months, in peacetime is indeed a money issue. But if they are engaged in some sort of action in the Spratley islands,,,or off the coast of Africa. That one small accident might as well have been an enemy attack.
A flattop out of service,,,is a flattop out of service just the same. And the national objective cannot be achieved when they need it.
Carriers demand excellence.

[Vroomfondel]

ping

[hosepipe]

[ Communist drone theory won’t allow success on carriers. ]

China doesn’t have a carrier for warlike purposes..
China use “the Carrier” for propaganda purposes.. wholly completely..
China carrier is completely propaganda platform..
Like when a cat puffs up to appear bigger.. and hisses..

ONE cruise missile on the 3 Gorges Dam and much of China would be flooded..
and Chinas electricity and drinking “WATER” would suffer greatly.. for a long time..

AND THEY KNOW IT!...

[RoadGumby]

While they may NOT care so much about the life of a pilot, the learning curve may well result in said pilot plowing into a critical structure (Island? Flight Deck, etc?) Material casualties are a lot harder to recover from than personnel.

[Jeff Head]

I do not think they will start this spring.

1st, they have a huge learning curve for basic carrier operations first. All of the crew needs to learn how to sail the carrier and keep her running.

2nd, they need to train their crew in how to conduct carrier flight ops. How to move, store and position aircraft. The traffic patterns, both on the deck and in the air, etc.

Finally, they have to have the aircraft for the pilots to train on. To dats I have only seen 4-5 J-15s that have actually been built. 2-3 in non-official colors that are clearly manufacturer aircraft doing tests. And now 3-4 in PLAN colors, which are also doing flight quals.

I would not expect them to start true (as in preparing for deployment) flight quals for the carrier.

They may fly a couple out and do quals for the aircraft itself...but it will be some time before they have a full wing of J-15s and then sometime after that before all of them are trained with their pilots in carrier ops to the point of dpeloying.

At least two years before aircraft deply with the carrier operationally, IMHO.

Sometime this year you may see a few landings and takeoffs as the test the actual aircraft...then they will make whatever changes necessary and upgrade the existing few aircraft and work those changes into production for the full production run.

In the mean time, here's a blog/review of my build of the Chinese Carrier in 1/350 scale, Trumpter's model:

My Review and Build of the 1/350 Chinese aircraft Carrier

[magslinger]

SONOBUOY PING!

Click on pic for past Navair pings. Post or FReepmail me if you wish to be enlisted in or discharged from the Navair Pinglist. The only requirement for inclusion in the Navair Pinglist is an interest in Naval Aviation. This is a medium to low volume pinglist.

[magslinger]

You brought up an excellent point by mentioning the Forrestal. The explosions and subsequent fires were the culmination of penny pinching decisions from on high, safety rules being short cut and lack of training. All of these are specialties of China.
Also it must be remembered that the initial explosions took out the trained fire fighting crews leaving brave but inadequately trained sailors desperately trying to do what they hadn’t been trained for. That’s why sailors of my generation and later receive as much fire fighting training as we do. An accident on the scale of the Forrestal fire happening on China’s carrier would set back their carrier program by months if not years. They don’t have the pool of trained sailors we had in the late 60’s.

[af_vet_rr]

Guess what China will use to cut us down, money!!!!

This sums it up perfectly. China can do far more damage to us economically than they can ever do to us militarily.

I always get a kick out of the people who think China will someday invade us or have an all-out war with us.

Why would they invade or have an all-out war when they are already here? They are already neck-deep in our economy. They don't make these investments with an eye towards a quick profit. They make investments with long-term goals.

[af_vet_rr]

ONE cruise missile on the 3 Gorges Dam and much of China would be flooded..

and Chinas electricity and drinking “WATER” would suffer greatly.. for a long time..

Interesting thought - I've always looked at it from the point of view that they can destroy us economically far easier than militarily, but when you flip it around, they have incredible vulnerabilities. Electricity I'm not sure - we're talking about 3% according to the articles out there. But it could do a helluva lot of damage downstream, and Shanghai is at the end of the river.

[hosepipe]

On the otherhand we have elected “a Manchurian Candidate” as President..
AND he has pretty much filled Washington D.C. with every traitor from Berkley in Mexifornia to Annapolis..

We did it to ourselves by allowing all (or most of) the brains of American women to sucked out..