How the USS Gerald R Ford’s new tech is proving the critics wrong
The USS Gerald R Ford anchored in the Solent off Portsmouth on 17 November. (Photo: author)
USS Gerald R Ford is the largest, most expensive and most advanced aircraft carrier ever built and has successfully deployed a raft of new technologies on its first operational deployment.
Despite past criticism from the Pentagon’s top weapons tester, the new technologies integrated into the USN’s latest aircraft carrier have shown value during its first operational deployment.
USS Gerald R Ford (CVN 78) integrates 23 new technologies, highlights of which include the ship’s Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS), Advanced Arresting Gear (AAG) and Advanced Weapons Elevators (AWEs).
In January, the latest annual report from the DoD’s weapons testing authority said the EMALS, arrestor gear, weapons elevators and dual-band radar were not hitting reliability targets.
The Director Operational Test & Evaluation (DOT&E) report highlighted the ‘low reliability’ of
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