PLAN Naval Aviation Training Facility

K

kroko

Senior Member
kwaigonegin said:
Even the old USSR in their prime did not have such a robust carrier program and they spent a much much higher percentage of their GdP on their Navy than China does.
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Not want to diminish china´s Carrier program, but the in the decade of 80´s, USSR did have a far more robust carrier program than china has today. Fom 1982 to 1988 they started construction of 3 large carriers (including a nuclear supercarrier with catapults). The soviet naval aviation center, NIKTA, (in presente day ukraine) AFAIK is equipped with catapult.

China still hasnt started construction of any carrier, and although it most certainly has a catapult program, we have seen little signs of it, or how advanced it is.

Of course, as you said, USSR spent a much higher percentage of GDP on the military than china and they had decades of heavy industry advance. And that contributed decisively for USSR bankrupcy, something that the chinese leaders know very well.

I have little doubt that with time and resources (that does china have), it will indeed have the second largest carrier force in the world. I think its a matter of when, not if. But in the short/médium term, it still cant achieve what USSR did in the 80´s.
 
kwaigonegin

kwaigonegin

Colonel
kroko said:
Not want to diminish china´s Carrier program, but the in the decade of 80´s, USSR did have a far more robust carrier program than china has today. Fom 1982 to 1988 they started construction of 3 large carriers (including a nuclear supercarrier with catapults). The soviet naval aviation center, NIKTA, (in presente day ukraine) AFAIK is equipped with catapult.

China still hasnt started construction of any carrier, and although it most certainly has a catapult program, we have seen little signs of it, or how advanced it is.

Of course, as you said, USSR spent a much higher percentage of GDP on the military than china and they had decades of heavy industry advance. And that contributed decisively for USSR bankrupcy, something that the chinese leaders know very well.

I have little doubt that with time and resources (that does china have), it will indeed have the second largest carrier force in the world. I think its a matter of when, not if. But in the short/médium term, it still cant achieve what USSR did in the 80´s.
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your're right kroko once their carrier program got underway they were quite aggresive.. however I meant to say the initial jumpstart ... that one PLAN so far has the USSR beat. I think in the next 10-20 years we will see their carrier program easily surpass even the USSR. PLAN will most likely be building CVs for sure if not CVNs and that was something the USSR never truly accomplished even during their prime. Yes they tried to built the Ulyanovsk but it never came anyway close to finishing so I'm not going to count it.
 
asif iqbal

asif iqbal

Lieutenant General
Certainly you cannot compare with Soviet Union

In its entire history the Soviet Union built 9 flat tops that is

Two Moskva Class
Four Kiev Class
Two Kuznetsov Class
And the Ulyanovsk, which I count as complete if Soviet Union did not collapse, say around 1993-4

Now if USSR was efficient and effective in its navy they would have all these operational and I am assuming a high level of training etc at any one time they could deploy

One Moskva Class for ASW
Atleast two Kiev Class
One Kuznetsov
And the one Ulyanosvk

This means out of the 9 flat tops they could launch 5 at any one time, let's say Moskva is used of helos only and two Kievs carry 16 aircraft each, the Kuznetsov lifts 24 and the Ulyanosvk 48 aircraft thats a total lift of 104 aircraft

I would think hey could manage 250 sorties per day with that, again assuming high level of training, thats equal to a new single Ford Class on a surge

This would have been 20 years ago, and today China is nowhere near that probably won't be until post 2020 which is 30 years after the Soviet Union

But the Soviet model did not work and whereas the Chinese does work, plus China has the correct approach and stratedgy and also the right way of doing things which means in the long run they will surpass the capability of the USSR but only in due course

Come to think of it the Soviet Union would have had a bigger carrier fleet than the Royal Navy, I think toward they end they really did have a good go at building carriers
 
kwaigonegin

kwaigonegin

Colonel
asif iqbal said:
Certainly you cannot compare with Soviet Union

In its entire history the Soviet Union built 9 flat tops that is

Two Moskva Class
Four Kiev Class
Two Kuznetsov Class
And the Ulyanovsk, which I count as complete if Soviet Union did not collapse, say around 1993-4

Now if USSR was efficient and effective in its navy they would have all these operational and I am assuming a high level of training etc at any one time they could deploy

One Moskva Class for ASW
Atleast two Kiev Class
One Kuznetsov
And the one Ulyanosvk

This means out of the 9 flat tops they could launch 5 at any one time, let's say Moskva is used of helos only and two Kievs carry 16 aircraft each, the Kuznetsov lifts 24 and the Ulyanosvk 48 aircraft thats a total lift of 104 aircraft

I would think hey could manage 250 sorties per day with that, again assuming high level of training, thats equal to a new single Ford Class on a surge

This would have been 20 years ago, and today China is nowhere near that probably won't be until post 2020 which is 30 years after the Soviet Union

But the Soviet model did not work and whereas the Chinese does work, plus China has the correct approach and stratedgy and also the right way of doing things which means in the long run they will surpass the capability of the USSR but only in due course

Come to think of it the Soviet Union would have had a bigger carrier fleet than the Royal Navy, I think toward they end they really did have a good go at building carriers
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except they didn't and what you said didn't happen. Also most of these carriers even if they were all in good shape weren't in the same fleet. Some were in Baltic, the Black sea, some were in Pacific and others in Atlantic so there is no way they could've mustered all the aircraft from all the carriers in a single location.

China's approach to this venture is right IMHO.. like I said in my previous post at this point in time they don't care about the actual numbers yet... they want to get the training, the infrastructure and all the other non tangibles in place first and slowly build up the number of ships and aircraft from there.

It's no point building or buying cars if you don't built the roads or have anyone who knows how to drive first. You build roads, your garage etc, you train drivers and THEN you can slowly buy the cars you really want. China bought a junk car but made it somewhat good enough to drive, to train and practice on while they are building roads and training drivers. Once they are somewhat proficient in those areas they may slowly go to a Chevy to a Caddy and then maybe a Ferrarri or two once they are really good drivers and have nice garages to park them in.
 
Jeff Head

Jeff Head

General
Registered Member
kwaigonegin said:
except they didn't and what you said didn't happen. Also most of these carriers even if they were all in good shape weren't in the same fleet. Some were in Baltic, the Black sea, some were in Pacific and others in Atlantic so there is no way they could've mustered all the aircraft from all the carriers in a single location.
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Two points here about the Soviets/Russian.

1) The Russians did build and deploy the Moskva. They did build and deploy all of the Kiev Class. The did build and deploy the Kuzentsov and were about to complete the Varyag when they came apart. In addition, they had the larger Ulyanosvk well under construction at the time too. So, they were well within reach of all of the things Asif mentioned...but time did run out. Or, more properly, they bankrupted themselves and money ran out.

2) The Soviets and the Russians can and did deploy the various vessels of their various fleets to different locations quite often. Clearly, if a situation warranted it, they would have put together a task force consisting of carriers and escorts from whichever fleets necessary to form up the TF they needed. That was not only within their capability...they did it on several occassions, and do it to this day.

kwaigonegin said:
like I said in my previous post at this point in time they don't care about the actual numbers yet... they want to get the training, the infrastructure and all the other non tangibles in place first and slowly build up the number of ships and aircraft from there.
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I agree that the PRC and PLAN are very methodically going about building up their Naval Air capabilities in terms of carriers, naval aviation, all of the escorts, and the policies necessary.

A part of that is, afterall, what this thread is about and is demonstrated with their Naval Air facilities.
 
Jeff Head

Jeff Head

General
Registered Member
This new facility has now REALLY produced its first fruit in terms of fixed air naval aviation for the PLAN.

The recent training exercise by the Liaoning when she went out to sea, was, among other things, to train pilots and qualify them for initial landings and take-offs from the carrier.

They took three aircraft with them to do so, J-15s 552, 553, and 554. Over the time period they were able to qualify six new pilots, all of whom certainly went through the regiment at this Naval Air Training Facility before they qualified on the Liaoning. And now they have:


2014-06-CV16-18.jpg

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Congrats to these newly qualified pilots. They have a lot of work and other qualifications yet before them.


[video=youtube;uLeUkkY122I]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLeUkkY122I[/video]
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Jeff Head

Jeff Head

General
Registered Member
Anyone hear of, or know of, and credible sources about the potential installation of a catapult at this facility? I seriously doubt it, since it would be in the test phase at this point and this is a training facility.

Anyone know of the installation of a steam cat at any active PLAN testing facility to this point?
 
D

delft

Brigadier
I think cats should remain at the place they are developed until about two years before they will be available in a carrier. Assuming that a 40k flattop with cats will be build or is building it will be one or two years before a cat appears at the training center at the very earliest.
I wonder indeed if such a flattop will be equipped with unmanned aircraft and the necessary cats and traps beside of course helicopters. That seems to me a good way to win a lot of experience relatively cheaply.
 
Equation

Equation

Lieutenant General
Jeff Head said:

2014-06-CV16-18.jpg

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Congrats to these newly qualified pilots. They have a lot of work and other qualifications yet before them.


[/center]
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So which one is Maverick, Hollywood, Iceman, Cougar (sorry pilots only, no navigators), and I say the one on the far right is Jester because he's older and balding?:p
 
Jeff Head

Jeff Head

General
Registered Member
Equation said:
So which one is Maverick, Hollywood, Iceman, Cougar (sorry pilots only, no navigators), and I say the one on the far right is Jester because he's older and balding?:p
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LOL!

Okay, here's my vote: from right to left, you have Jester, then Iceman, then Maverick, then skip one and the next one, IMHO, is Hollywood.
 
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