French Navy upgrade and discussion
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French Navy's New OPV (Patrouilleur Hauturier) Showcased at Euronaval 2024 - Naval News
At Euronaval 2024, the DGA presented for the first time a scale model of the new offshore patrol vessel design for the French Navy.
www.navalnews.com
The UK is also sending a CBG to the IOR this year with a stopover in India. Busy season for the IN.
A US aircraft carrier “sunk” by a French submarine
The feat is worth mentioning. An American aircraft carrier, the USS Theodore Roosevelt and part of its escort were “sunk” by a French nuclear attack submarine, the Saphir, during an exercise off the coast of Florida.
This is what we learn from reading the Cols bleus website. Or rather what we learned. Because the article was quickly unpublished. It nevertheless remains accessible in cache. The great American ally does not necessarily appreciate this kind of cock-a-doodle-doo. And above all, that the vulnerability of its aircraft carriers is thus exposed to the light of day. Especially since the SSN Saphir, with its thirty-four years of service, is not exactly a latest-generation submarine.
The aim of the exercise was to train an American carrier group composed of the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt, several Ticonderoga or Arleigh Burke-class cruisers and destroyers and a Los Angeles-class submarine, before their operational deployment.
In the second phase of the exercise, the French submarine was integrated into the enemy forces and had the mission of locating the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt, as well as its escort ships, and of being ready to attack. "With the political situation deteriorating day by day, the Saphir slipped discreetly into the heart of the screen formed by the American frigates protecting the aircraft carrier, while avoiding counter-detection by the omnipresent air assets," says Cols bleus. On the morning of the last day, the order to fire was finally given, allowing the Saphir to fictitiously sink the Theodore Roosevelt and most of its escort."
A virtual torpedoing that confirms a well-known adage: "There are two types of military vessels: submarines and their targets."
This is not the first time that a submarine has succeeded in fictitiously sinking an aircraft carrier. For example, the HMCS Corner Brook, a conventional Canadian diesel-electric submarine, had sunk the British aircraft carrier Illustrious in 2007 during an exercise in the Atlantic./deepl
thx!
a few more pics and details
PA-NG: the new visuals of the future French aircraft carrier
04/11/2024 by Vincent Groizeleau (paywall)[w/ggtrad] While detailed preliminary design studies continue with a view to ordering the vessel at the end of 2025, the design of the new-generation French aircraft carrier (PA-NG) continues to be refined. On the occasion of the opening of the Euronaval show this Monday, November 4 [2024], we offer you a preview of the very latest visuals of the successor to the Charles de Gaulle.
Designed by Naval Group and Chantiers de l'Atlantique, united within the company MO Porte-avions (65% NG, 35% CA), TechnicAtome being for its part the project manager of the #two new nuclear boilers of the K22 type which will equip this ship, the PA-NG will be built in Saint-Nazaire.
Scheduled to be ordered at the end of 2025 for delivery in 2038, it will be the largest warship built to date in Europe and one of the most imposing in the world. 310 meters long and 85 meters wide at the flight deck (39 meters at the waterline), the PA-NG will have a displacement at full load of 78,000 tons, almost twice as much as the Charles de Gaulle (42,500 tpc), which measures 261.5 meters long and 64 meters wide at the maximum (31.5 meters at the waterline).
Images showing a ship equipped with three EMALS catapults
Armed by 1,100 crew members, to which will be added 600 personnel for the embarked air group (GAé), a staff of 100 officers and still room for 200 additional specialists, the PA-NG is designed to have three EMALS (Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System) catapults and three AAG (Advanced Arresting Gear) arresting gears. These new-generation electromagnetic systems, developed for the new Gerald R. Ford class aircraft carriers of the US Navy, are produced by the American group General Atomics. They replace the traditional steam catapults and arresting gears with hydraulic brake presses, offering much greater power and flexibility of use. While the AAGs will be installed on the oblique runway of the PA-NG, the locations of the three catapults, clearly visible on the new images, are positioned for two of them at the front of the ship, the EMALS located furthest to starboard does not overflow the oblique runway. This will allow, unlike the Charles de Gaulle, to carry out catapulting and landing simultaneously. The third location is located on the front of the oblique runway.
For the time being, the decision has not yet been made by the Ministry of the Armed Forces concerning the acquisition of two or three catapults, knowing that the addition of a third, if it obviously represents an additional cost, will not require modification of the energy generation system, which will be sized for three pieces of equipment of this type. A configuration with three EMALS would in any case make it possible to significantly increase the ship's catapult capabilities, essential for countering a sudden attack or launching a massive air raid, while providing valuable redundancy in the event of the technical unavailability of one of the other two catapults. For comparison, American aircraft carriers have four catapults and the new Chinese aircraft carrier Fujian has three.
Launching much heavier aircraft and drones
Significantly longer (105 meters instead of 75) and more powerful than the two steam catapults of the C13-3 type (already of American origin) with which the Charles de Gaulle is equipped, the EMALS will make it possible to launch much heavier aircraft (more than 35 tons compared to 25) while offering a more gradual increase in power that will facilitate their use for aerial drones; in particular the future stealth autonomous combat aircraft (UCAV), which France will equip itself with with the F5 standard of the Rafale, which will enter service at the beginning of the 2030s.
The PA-NG air fleet will consist of around forty aircraft, including combat aircraft (Rafale Marine and its successor), E-2D Advanced Hawkeye airborne warning aircraft (three have been ordered to replace the current E-2Cs of the naval aviation between 2028 and 2030), as well as helicopters (NH90 Caïman Marine and H160 Guépard Marine). Surveillance drones and UCAVs will be added. The aeronautical facilities, including the hangar, the two elevators and the flight deck (which will have a surface area of 17,000 m², compared to 12,000 m² for the Charles de Gaulle) are sized to accommodate the successor to the Rafale, a fifth-generation fighter planned to be developed as part of the SCAF (future air combat system) program, initiated in 2017 by France and Germany, joined in 2019 by Spain. It is industrially supported by Airbus Defence and Space and Dassault Aviation. The New Generation Fighter (NGF), whose development is led by Dassault, will be a stealth aircraft with internal weapons bays significantly larger than the Rafale (around 35 tonnes). It will be one of the components of the SCAF, which will also include drones and a combat cloud allowing all capabilities to operate in a network.
Sensors and armament
Moved to the rear, while that of the Charles de Gaulle is placed further forward, the PA-NG island has been redesigned again, in particular its front face. It integrates most of the ship's sensors and communication means, including the new active antenna radar and four fixed Sea Fire panels from Thales, which equip the new defence and intervention frigates (FDI) for the first time.
Although the PA-NG will be firmly escorted by frigates ensuring its protection against air, surface or submarine threats, the aircraft carrier will have powerful means of self-protection. Here again, the details of this equipment are not formally confirmed, but the computer-generated images give an idea of what they could be. Like the Charles de Gaulle, the future French aircraft carrier will be equipped with vertical launchers to house MBDA Aster surface-to-air missiles. In the latest views that we are showing you today, developments have occurred compared to the previous computer-generated images, published at the end of 2022. We can now see three octuple launchers, all on the port side, i.e. two housed together in a corbel in the center of the ship and a third at the rear (the current French aircraft carrier has two pairs of launchers - starboard forward and port center). Added to this are four 40 mm cannons, but compared to previous illustrations of the PA-NG, these are no longer RAPIDFire Naval systems from the Thales/KNDS (Nexter) tandem, the new images showing turrets from the Swedish Bofors. Added to this, as in previous views, are short-range surface-to-air systems Simbad-RC (MBDA) equipped with Mistral 3 missiles.
Two nuclear boilers and electric propulsion
Capable of reaching a speed of 27 knots, the future French aircraft carrier will be equipped with fully electric propulsion, with energy provided by the two K22 onboard reactors of 220 MW each, designed by TechnicAtome. These boilers, thanks to the heat released by their nuclear cores, will produce pressurized steam driving turbines that will generate electricity via alternators. This will supply the needs of the ship and will be used to operate electric propulsion motors that will turn three shaft lines. Compared to the old mechanical architecture with its propulsion turbines, this solution allows much more flexibility in managing the electrical power required (75% being intended for propulsion) while offering various advantages, including a reduction in the length of the shaft lines. The propulsion apparatus will be divided into two separate units (each with a boiler room and a module comprising two turbines and their alternators) which will be integrated into an ultra-resistant nuclear section, around a hundred meters long and placed in the center of the building.
A final major technical stop for the Charles de Gaulle
The PA-NG, scheduled to reach Toulon in 2035 to load its reactors with nuclear fuel and then begin its sea trials by 2036, is to succeed the Charles de Gaulle in 2038, in service since 2001 and which will benefit from a third and final major technical stop (ATM) in 2027 and 2028. On this occasion, the sensors of the current aircraft carrier of the French Navy will be modernized. The original rotating radars, the DRBV-26D and DRBV-15C surveillance radars, as well as the Arabel for the control of the Aster surface-to-air missiles, will be disembarked and replaced by the new Sea Fire from Thales. This development will lead to major work on the island of the Charles de Gaulle, which will change its head on this occasion in order to integrate the four fixed panels of its new multifunction radar. It should be noted that the SMART-S surveillance radar, which replaced the DRBJ-11B during the ship's second ATM in 2017/2018, will be retained to serve as redundancy (the PA-NG itself must have a rotating surveillance radar in addition to the Sea Fire). Other elements will also be modernized, this project will be an opportunity, like the main radar, to prepare PA-NG system architectures. At the end of its ATM 3, the Charles de Gaulle will also be able to implement the new Aster 15 EC missiles, the range of which will be doubled compared to the current Aster 15 (60 km instead of 30).
A study to see if the boiler rooms could be extended beyond 2038
The General Delegate for Armaments, Emmanuel Chiva, finally indicated, during his recent hearing before the Defense Committee of the National Assembly, that a study would be conducted on the two K15 boiler rooms of the building, which are opened at each ATM to unload the irradiated fuel elements and replace them with new rods. An operation that allows the tanks to be inspected in passing. The objective will be to know in what exact state they are, how they behave as they age and if, if necessary, they would be sufficiently safe to allow the building to be extended beyond 2038. The boiler rooms, which diverged for the first time in the spring of 1998, will then have 40 years of operation.
If the answer is positive, this would leave room for maneuver in the event of any setbacks in the PA-NG program, while also opening the way to a possible extension of the Charles de Gaulle by a few years to ensure a transition, with a view to possibly building a second new-generation aircraft carrier. While the operational interest of a pair of PA-NGs to regain a permanent presence in the French naval group is obvious, this is obviously not the preferred hypothesis today given the state of public finances. This is while the development and construction of the first vessel will already cost more than 10 billion euros. But we do not know what the coming years will bring. In any case, it is certain that the DGA, the French Navy and of course the manufacturers do not want the schedule to slip. Chantiers de l'Atlantique, which has a full order book and is already working on contracts for giant cruise ships to be delivered by the early 2030s, cannot immobilize its main completion basin afloat, unless it loses valuable contracts (large cruise ships represent markets worth €1.5 billion) with consequences for the workload and employment. Laurent Castaing, the CEO of Chantiers de l'Atlantique, was very clear on this point last May.
Such a scenario would also be problematic for the French Navy in terms of human resources, unless an extension of the Charles de Gaulle, if technically possible, is part of the perspective of a return to a fleet of two aircraft carriers, which will have to be anticipated a decade in advance to train the necessary personnel. Finally, keeping the ship in service longer than planned, if this is technically possible (the question of the reactors being far from being the only one that would need to be answered), would cost a lot of money. Recharging the nuclear cores allows the ship to sail for 10 years, the time between two ATMs. This means that, unless we save the aircraft carrier's nuclear fuel potential for a decade, between 2028 and 2038, in other words limit the use of the ship in order to postpone its end of life, we would have to consider a fourth and costly major technical shutdown to reload the reactors again. And at the same time, carry out a complete overhaul of all the equipment, not to mention dealing with obsolescence. [/ggtrad]
(ps: no pic with drone nor scaf )