PLAN Carrier Operations..News, Videos & Photos

In carrier landings, it is better to overshoot than undershoot, because if you overshoot and miss the wires, you can lift off again no bother since you will be kicking the engines up to full power as soon as you hit the deck. Much harder to recover and have another go if you are smeared all over the back end of the boat.

When your deck crews are as green as your pilots (so the pilots cannot reliably count on the deck officer to wave him off if he looks like he is coming in short), the best option is to play it safe and make sure you hit the middle of the deck and simply forget about the wires. After a few such passes, with both the pilots and deck officer getting a better feel of where the plane will end up if it came in at a certain angle and speed, then you have a go at trying to catch the wires.

Something else to consider is that those skid marks only represent where the back wheels touched down on the deck. The tailhook is a good distance behind the rear wheels on a Flanker, and naval fighters come into landings at relatively high AoAs, and that means that often the tail hook is in contact with the deck a slip second before the rear wheels. When you are coming in at nearly 300 mph, a split second can easily translate into a couple dozen metres or more, and that would put the tail hook nicely among the wires.

Originally Posted by plawolf

Something else to consider is that those skid marks only represent where the back wheels touched down on the deck. The tailhook is a good distance behind the rear wheels on a Flanker, and naval fighters come into landings at relatively high AoAs, and that means that often the tail hook is in contact with the deck a slip second before the rear wheels. When you are coming in at nearly 300 mph, a split second can easily translate into a couple dozen metres or more, and that would put the tail hook nicely among the wires.

That's actually an excellent point, one which many of us overlooked. The tailhook is usually a few meters behind the rear landing gear, and in the case of a plane as large as the flanker... well all you need to do is google pictures of J-15 or Su-33 and then eyeball where the skid marks are.

Touching down in that particular area could lead to catching the third or fourth cables quite plausibly I think. Considering there are multiple skid marks in the same location I have half a mind to believe that multiple traps have already been made.

Originally Posted by plawolf

In carrier landings, it is better to overshoot than undershoot, because if you overshoot and miss the wires, you can lift off again no bother since you will be kicking the engines up to full power as soon as you hit the deck. Much harder to recover and have another go if you are smeared all over the back end of the boat.

When your deck crews are as green as your pilots (so the pilots cannot reliably count on the deck officer to wave him off if he looks like he is coming in short), the best option is to play it safe and make sure you hit the middle of the deck and simply forget about the wires. After a few such passes, with both the pilots and deck officer getting a better feel of where the plane will end up if it came in at a certain angle and speed, then you have a go at trying to catch the wires.

Something else to consider is that those skid marks only represent where the back wheels touched down on the deck. The tailhook is a good distance behind the rear wheels on a Flanker, and naval fighters come into landings at relatively high AoAs, and that means that often the tail hook is in contact with the deck a slip second before the rear wheels. When you are coming in at nearly 300 mph, a split second can easily translate into a couple dozen metres or more, and that would put the tail hook nicely among the wires.

Gentlemen, gentlemen, if you ain't in the zone you ain't, you will get a wave off PERIOD!!!!!. The tail hook is retracted until you intend to TRAP!!!!
Give the PLAN a little credit, the folks on the boat know what a good approach looks like, if you ain't on the glad path, you are history, you will get a wave off PERIOD..... not maybe, this is rocket science, they have done their home work, and your airspeed ain't gonna be 250 knots, the gear is down, the flaps are down, the speed brake is up, the powerplant is spooled UP, its not at idle, as soon as you roll the mains, the throttle is slammed to the stop, just in case!

I seriously doubt the plan has played around doing a touch and go, that is about as likely as a Marine Corp FA-18 having made the first touch an go, when the plan starts air ops, they will proceed in earnest, in a methodical, step by step manner, just like everything else they have done with CV-16, by the book-----NO SWEAT---NO COWBOY BUSINESS--- this is rocket science, every approach will be scrutinized down to stick movements, throttle position, and the size of the beads of sweat on your forehead. It will be conducted under perfect conditions, with a very well trained and highly proficient CREW, from the Deck Officer, on up to the man with his hand on throttle and stick, it WILL be well ORCHESTRATED! and Wolfie no-boody in the PLAN will ever use MPH, it is KNOTS, ask bd. I would guess IAS at 145-155 knots, for the approach?

Say the carrier has 10 levels under the flight deck, the island has 9.

Gentlemen, gentlemen, if you ain't in the zone you ain't, you will get a wave off PERIOD!!!!!. The tail hook is retracted until you intend to TRAP!!!!
Give the PLAN a little credit, the folks on the boat know what a good approach looks like, if you ain't on the glad path, you are history, you will get a wave off PERIOD..... not maybe, this is rocket science, they have done their home work, and your airspeed ain't gonna be 250 knots, the gear is down, the flaps are down, the speed brake is up, the powerplant is spooled UP, its not at idle, as soon as you roll the mains, the throttle is slammed to the stop, just in case!

AFB you are my new hero!

What he's described is a bolter..

from wiki.. wiki is correct on this!

In naval aviation, a bolter occurs when an aircraft attempting an arrested landing on the flight deck of an aircraft carrier touches down, but fails to catch an arrestor cable and come to a stop.Bolter aircraft accelerate at full throttle and become airborne in order to go around to re-attempt the landing.

Originally Posted by Jeff Head

It has to do with the purpose that the Soviets had in designing and building these carriers where the tempo of air ops was not as important to their overall purpose as it is to US Carriers. I thiink the PLAN will ultimately have a purpose much more aligned with the US policy for carriers and will ultimately have smaller islands.

The original design will not have had an island that was made willfully larger than necessary. But the use China will make of its flattops, although also defensive, will not need, I expect, an island as large as that.
You want as large a flight deck area for a given size of ship and China will probably not want flattops larger than Liaoning. The main function is not bombing ground targets so the alpha strike can be somewhat smaller than for USN super carriers. The smaller flattops are cheaper and so more can be build in the next twenty years or so. Besides they are less threatening to other countries and the contrast with USN can be stressed.

Originally Posted by A.Man

A Lot More Touch Downs Than We Thought!

Really? Come on! Do you think that during the hand over ceremony they would have it marked up like that? Besides, I have a picture taken at the same time, before hand over that shows the same place on deck.

Besides, look at the marks themselves...they look like someone copied a particular mark that was there (the ones showed earlier) and then resized and copied them across the deck there.

So I am calling a blatant BS, PS!

Originally Posted by delft

The original design will not have had an island that was made willfully larger than necessary. But the use China will make of its flattops, although also defensive, will not need, I expect, an island as large as that.
You want as large a flight deck area for a given size of ship and China will probably not want flattops larger than Liaoning. The main function is not bombing ground targets so the alpha strike can be somewhat smaller than for USN super carriers. The smaller flattops are cheaper and so more can be build in the next twenty years or so. Besides they are less threatening to other countries and the contrast with USN can be stressed.

No one said is was made larger than "necessary." I provided a link to my original statement. You might read it to see my full explanation because I covered this point there in detail.

The Russians had a different concept for carrier use and they made a vessel to meet those needs. The Chinese purchased this vessel, refit it and now have it. They (probably due to structural reasons) did not change the footprint of the island. That island gives up deck space...but that carrier is better than no carrier and is an excellent starting point for the PLAN.

Originally Posted by Jeff Head

Really? Come on! Do you think that during the hand over ceremony they would have it marked up like that? Besides, I have a picture taken at the same time, before hand over that shows the same place on deck.

So I am calling a blatant BS, PS!

Jeff, there are multiple photos showing the same skid marks, all from very different angles -- the photo you have as a case study wouldn't show the markings very well, or at all. Even A-Man's photo isn't very clear -- but this one, which is a more higher quality version from the same angle as his picture, shows the skid marks quiet clearly, consistent with every other close up or high quality picture we have of that area.



I think the evidence is near unquestionable now -- those are skid marks of either touch and gos, or arrested landings of fixed wing ai






If they did a PS they must've been really comprehensive about it. Even the news report videos have been edited to show the skid marks!

An interesting interview with the carrier´s new captain. (from Alert 5 - Military Aviation News)

YouTube: Interview in English with captain of Liaoning

Originally Posted by alopes

An interesting interview with the carrier´s new captain.

YouTube: Interview in English with captain of Liaoning

Dear lord is it just me or does the captains' english sound better than the interviewer and news anchor's english?

I gotta say the captain seemed quite well spoken and somewhat personable too. Though I'd expect nothing less than the cream of the crop the PLAN has to offer for the entire crew of liaoning so that's definitely not a surprise.

Originally Posted by Bltizo

Dear lord is it just me or does the captains' english sound better than the interviewer and news anchor's english?

I gotta say the captain seemed quite well spoken and somewhat personable too. Though I'd expect nothing less than the cream of the crop the PLAN has to offer for the entire crew of liaoning so that's definitely not a surprise.

from what I can tell, it sounds like he studied in Europe.

Originally Posted by Player99

Now, by responding to Geographer, I skipped lots of posts and therefore I don't know if this bit has been noticed:

凤凰卫视9月26日《凤凰早班车》节目播出“中国第二艘在建航母曝光预计年底下水”，以下为文 字实录：

杨舒：中国第一艘航母才刚刚交付海军使用，而各界已经高度期待中国第二艘航空母舰了。

《明报》的报道说，中国第二艘完全国产的航母正在上海长兴岛上建造，预计今年年底就可以下水。

It reports rumors that China's domestic carrier has been under construction (this we have heard at least since one or two years ago), and is projected to launch by the year end.

I would expect the building of the next fleet carrier to await a year or so of experience with Liaonang. Of coarse a lot can be built before that experience is needed but you do not want to reach a point in which you have to demolish part of your ship even before she ever floated. Remember the poor RN when the British government flip-flopped over the F-35 version.
If a carrier is already building it should be a training carrier of about 15000 t. After all PLAN has an enormous amount of training and testing to do and it might be a good idea to unload the initial carrier flight training onto such a vessel. I would then prefer a twin turbo-prop with a configuration similar to the Westland Wyvern but with coaxial propellers, the front propeller with one blade less than the rear propeller, which has a smaller diameter than the front propeller. That would increase efficiency and decrease noise. Perhaps there were discussions on this subject and these then let to these rumors. If it was true we would already have be seen such a trainer aircraft. I do not think JL-9H fits the bill for the use of a smaller trainer carrier.
So my expectation is: no carrier is already building for two years.

I think the anchor man English still sound better than the captain.

Originally Posted by Air Force Brat

Gentlemen, gentlemen, if you ain't in the zone you ain't, you will get a wave off PERIOD!!!!!. The tail hook is retracted until you intend to TRAP!!!!
Give the PLAN a little credit, the folks on the boat know what a good approach looks like, if you ain't on the glad path, you are history, you will get a wave off PERIOD..... not maybe, this is rocket science, they have done their home work, and your airspeed ain't gonna be 250 knots, the gear is down, the flaps are down, the speed brake is up, the powerplant is spooled UP, its not at idle, as soon as you roll the mains, the throttle is slammed to the stop, just in case!

I seriously doubt the plan has played around doing a touch and go, that is about as likely as a Marine Corp FA-18 having made the first touch an go, when the plan starts air ops, they will proceed in earnest, in a methodical, step by step manner, just like everything else they have done with CV-16, by the book-----NO SWEAT---NO COWBOY BUSINESS--- this is rocket science, every approach will be scrutinized down to stick movements, throttle position, and the size of the beads of sweat on your forehead. It will be conducted under perfect conditions, with a very well trained and highly proficient CREW, from the Deck Officer, on up to the man with his hand on throttle and stick, it WILL be well ORCHESTRATED! and Wolfie no-boody in the PLAN will ever use MPH, it is KNOTS, ask bd. I would guess IAS at 145-155 knots, for the approach?

Most of what you say makes perfect sense. But as PLAN is not trained by USN there is no reason to play around with mph and kts. They can just use km/h. Didn't Ernest K. Gann write a novel about a plane flying from Honolulu to Los Angeles when the navigator mixed up statute miles and sea miles?