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Speaker 1: Get in touch with technology with text stuff from Hey

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Speaker 1: there and welcome to Text Stuff. I am your host

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Speaker 1: extordanaire Jonathan Strickland and with me in the studio today.

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Speaker 1: Is you know him? You love him? Scott Benjamin? Oh,

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Speaker 1: they do? Really, I get notes people love when you're

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Speaker 1: on the show. That's impressive. Yeah, yeah, people? What that

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Speaker 1: my that my listeners can read and write? Now? No, no, no,

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Speaker 1: I wasn't saying that. It was just you never know

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Speaker 1: these things. That's true. That's true. Yeah. You you come

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Speaker 1: on as a guest onto my show and you are

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Speaker 1: not pretty to the community case that come into the

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Speaker 1: tech stuff world. I should let you know more frequently

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Speaker 1: that people do enjoy when you're on. Well, that's nice.

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Speaker 1: I appreciate it, and I have a great time when

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Speaker 1: I'm here. So I'm glad to be back. And this

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Speaker 1: is a topic that I'm I'm pretty excited about talking

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Speaker 1: about today. Yeah. I picked something that was outside of

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Speaker 1: our our our respective wheelhouses a little bit. Aircraft carriers

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Speaker 1: and super carriers. And this this was something that came

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Speaker 1: about because many ages ago, when I was first making

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Speaker 1: up the topic list of potential topics for tech Stuff.

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Speaker 1: One of the news items at the time was about

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Speaker 1: the next generation of super carriers here in the United States,

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Speaker 1: the Ford class aircraft carrier. So we're gonna be talking

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Speaker 1: a lot about the current state of the art, which

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Speaker 1: is the Nimmits class aircraft carrier. We'll talk about the

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Speaker 1: next generation, we'll talk about previous generations. But to start

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Speaker 1: it all off, I wanted to explain how amazing, how

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Speaker 1: old this this idea is. It actually predates controlled flight. Yes, right,

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Speaker 1: you know, I don't know a whole lot about this,

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Speaker 1: because we did. We were digging into aircraft carriers and

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Speaker 1: just kind of as a side note of some some

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Speaker 1: article that I was reading, it had mentioned that in

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Speaker 1: the late nineteenth century they were using ships to launch

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Speaker 1: manned balloons, right for reconnaissance, uh missions and things like that.

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Speaker 1: It was always it was always about reconnaissance, and it

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Speaker 1: was about monitoring the enemy, right, because in the nineteenth century,

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Speaker 1: the navies around the world, we're relying heavily upon battleship

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Speaker 1: class dreadnoughts, these enormous ships with heavy weaponry on them

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Speaker 1: that would batter one another. That was how naval battles

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Speaker 1: were decided back in the late nineteenth and early twentieth

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Speaker 1: centuries and so much so that any idea, like any

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Speaker 1: thought of using air support was mainly just to get

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Speaker 1: a look around and see where the enemy was. Like

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Speaker 1: that was the only purpose, right. They were not thought

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Speaker 1: of as this would be, We're gonna weaponize balloons. It

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Speaker 1: was more like, we need eyes in the sky so

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Speaker 1: that we know where the enemy might be. Well, even

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Speaker 1: during the American Civil War they use balloons, uh, they would.

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Speaker 1: They would flow a balloon from their camp to check

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Speaker 1: out what the enemy was doing, you know, on the

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Speaker 1: other side of the hill, and then bring it back down.

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Speaker 1: But then the intent was never to to fire from

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Speaker 1: up there anything. It was just to keep an eye

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Speaker 1: on the on the enemy exactly exactly. And that's the

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Speaker 1: same thing is true with the earliest days of aircraft

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Speaker 1: carriers in the in the respect and the way we

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Speaker 1: think of them now. What surprised me was that it

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Speaker 1: did not take long at all from the moment that

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Speaker 1: we have controlled flight that is a heavier than air

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Speaker 1: aircraft that can fly through the control of a human being,

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Speaker 1: and the first attempts at making an aircraft carrier. So

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Speaker 1: I know that there is some disagreement about who was

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Speaker 1: truly responsible for the first heavier than air aircraft. We're

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Speaker 1: gonna go with the right brothers for this one. And

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Speaker 1: they flew at Kittie Hawk in nineteen o three. It

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Speaker 1: took less than a decade before the United States military

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Speaker 1: started saying, may maybe we can launch one of these

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Speaker 1: suckers from a boat. Yeah, not a bad idea. Uh yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean that's that's always the kind of the way

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Speaker 1: it goes right with the militator's thinking. They're thinking, well,

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Speaker 1: you know what, this could be a devastating machine of war.

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Speaker 1: Exactly where can we make this work for us? So

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Speaker 1: that's that's exactly what they did. They said, well, let's, uh,

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Speaker 1: let's try to figure out a way to make it. Well,

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Speaker 1: they need a nice big takeoff and landing area, but

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Speaker 1: well there's no way really to do that on a

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Speaker 1: boat unless we build something that's maybe made out of

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Speaker 1: wood that's a huge flat deck. Let's try that. And

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Speaker 1: they did and it worked. Yeah, it was It was crazy.

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Speaker 1: They built They built a temporary wooden deck on top

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Speaker 1: of the USS Birmingham in nineteen ten. This was truly

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Speaker 1: just an experiment, right, it was just a proof of concept,

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Speaker 1: and they found a brave man, or some might say lunatic,

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Speaker 1: to attempt to fly a tiny biplane, a Curtis biplane

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Speaker 1: fifty horsepower, fifty horsepower, a fifty hor power biplane. Can

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Speaker 1: you imagine you're rolling down this wooden this wooden platform

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Speaker 1: that's built on top of a battleship. It's the battleship

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Speaker 1: was not meant to do this right, it was they

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Speaker 1: had to shore up all this area to create a

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Speaker 1: a wooden structure for you to roll across, not necessarily

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Speaker 1: knowing if you would be able to reach the right

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Speaker 1: speed to be able to take off, or if you

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Speaker 1: would just plunge off the end into the ocean. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: this is a this is a scary prospect having for

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Speaker 1: this guy. I mean, his name is he was actually

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Speaker 1: a civilian pilot. His name was Eugene Burton Eli And uh,

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Speaker 1: this is so strange the way this is written. And

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Speaker 1: I'll read it the way it's written, and then I'll

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Speaker 1: explain because it sounds so weird. It says on November fourteen,

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Speaker 1: a twenty four year old civilian, civilian pilot, again Eugene,

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Speaker 1: took off in a fifty horsepower Curtis plane from the

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Speaker 1: bow of the Birmingham, which is a you know, wooden

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Speaker 1: platform cruiser again and later landed a Curtis model D

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Speaker 1: on Pennsylvania in on January eighteenth of nineteen eleven. So

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Speaker 1: those of you that were listening while I will realize

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Speaker 1: that it wasn't a two month flight and he didn't

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Speaker 1: change planes in mid air. They just hadn't figured out

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Speaker 1: the landing bit of this yet. Yeah, So so this

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Speaker 1: happens like two months apart or three months apart maybe,

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Speaker 1: So you know what happened was they did the first one, uh,

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Speaker 1: and then the second, the second attempt. The second test

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Speaker 1: took place in San Francisco Bay, that's where the Pennsylvania

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Speaker 1: was anchored, and he took off from a from from

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Speaker 1: a landing strip on on land, took off, flew out

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Speaker 1: to the ship, landed on it, stayed for an hour,

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Speaker 1: took off from the ship, and landed back on the mainland. Interesting,

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Speaker 1: so that's actually the first time that both both of

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Speaker 1: those things happened at one time. That the initial uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, the initial takeoff I guess was it was

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Speaker 1: just a one time deal and they just wanted to

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Speaker 1: see if they could do it. They didn't even really

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Speaker 1: considered landing at this point. I'm sure they were thinking

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Speaker 1: about it, but they weren't willing, willing to risk it yet.

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Speaker 1: They needed a couple more months to to develop a

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Speaker 1: way to do it, or maybe to look into the

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Speaker 1: stats of how long it took a Curtis Model D

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Speaker 1: to actually come to a stop, right, Because, yeah, if

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Speaker 1: it's longer than the boat is, you've got yourself a problem.

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Speaker 1: As it turns out, we would come up with ways

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Speaker 1: to address that problem. Now here's the interesting thing to me.

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Speaker 1: The U. S. Military was very quick to test out

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Speaker 1: this idea, but they were not quick to implement it. Uh.

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Speaker 1: The navy at the time was largely of the United

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Speaker 1: States Navy, I should say, it was largely of the

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Speaker 1: opinion that this was still the domain of the big battleships,

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Speaker 1: and soon the cruisers would follow. Cruisers would be slightly smaller,

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Speaker 1: slightly more maneuverable, faster ships than battleships. And we're talking

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Speaker 1: about World War One era, yeah ships. Yeah. Pre World

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Speaker 1: War One, into World War One, the United States was

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Speaker 1: not terribly concerned with adding air power to that. However,

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Speaker 1: the British were definitely interested, and they began to innovate

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Speaker 1: in this space. Early early on UH, they began to

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Speaker 1: experiment with navy ships. First they were using essentially a

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Speaker 1: version of of water landing planes like seaplanes, but they

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Speaker 1: were those are very slow there once they landing and

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Speaker 1: taking off the slow and getting them aboard a ship

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Speaker 1: required the use of cranes. So it was it was

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Speaker 1: not a good process if you were under the possibility

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Speaker 1: of being under fire from an enemy, have that quick exactly.

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Speaker 1: So they started looking into other UH possibilities and it

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Speaker 1: was the British Navy in nineteen eighteen that commissioned the

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Speaker 1: first true practical aircraft carrier. It was the h M

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Speaker 1: S Argus. Interesting and so the Argus is our first

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Speaker 1: practical aircraft carrier. It had a large flat deck, which

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Speaker 1: became standard for all aircraft carriers following ever since UM

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Speaker 1: and that allowed for the landing and taking off of aircraft.

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Speaker 1: It was also the first that had an electrically powered

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Speaker 1: elevator to move aircraft from the hangar deck to the

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Speaker 1: flight deck. Very smart and it's something we still see today. Yes,

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Speaker 1: and that means that you can actually carry a lot

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Speaker 1: more vehicles. Plus you don't have to worry like if

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Speaker 1: if really bad weather is coming in. You can house

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Speaker 1: them in the hangar deck as as opposed to having

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Speaker 1: them have to secure them to the flight deck, which

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Speaker 1: could be pretty dangerous to put. You know, these are

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Speaker 1: huge vehicles. So that lays the groundwork for the beginning

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Speaker 1: of aircraft uh aircraft carrier history. But we're gonna skip

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Speaker 1: ahead to how they work today, and then later on

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Speaker 1: I'll tell you more about the various classes of aircraft

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Speaker 1: carriers that the United States specifically has used over the

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Speaker 1: history of the Navy. Can I kind of maybe just

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Speaker 1: say one thing here, and maybe I'm jumping too far ahead,

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Speaker 1: but during World War One their use was extremely limited.

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Speaker 1: They really didn't even put any kind of emphasis on

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Speaker 1: it at all. It really wasn't part of World War

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Speaker 1: One strategy in any way. But during World War Two

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Speaker 1: they played a critical role. Instrumental, Yeah, extremely critical because

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Speaker 1: and this is this I found this interesting. There was

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Speaker 1: a side note about one of the battles um that

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Speaker 1: was fought during World War Two, and it said that

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Speaker 1: the Battle of the Coral Sea became the first sea

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Speaker 1: battle in history in which neither opposing fleet saw the

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Speaker 1: other one. That is so interesting. I mean, imagine that

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Speaker 1: there's a there's a sea battle happening where you don't

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Speaker 1: see the other ship right because the battle is being

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Speaker 1: fought by the planes in the air that they're launching

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Speaker 1: towards each other. I mean, it's it's such a strange

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Speaker 1: thought that before that that never happened. Exactly you had

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Speaker 1: you had planes that were dropping bombs. They're dropping torpedoes,

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Speaker 1: so the planes were the weapons, right instead of instead

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Speaker 1: of ships firing guns at one another, they're essentially launching

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Speaker 1: planes at one another. And this is so far apart

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Speaker 1: they cannot see each and this is so interesting because

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Speaker 1: I mean, if you think about it, and again you

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Speaker 1: have to put yourself in the mind frame, you know

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Speaker 1: that they were back in the nineteen forties. This is

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Speaker 1: brand new because if you want to get a plane

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Speaker 1: over a se battle, first, you probably wouldn't know where

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Speaker 1: it's happening, and you wouldn't be able to communicate that

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Speaker 1: and get that coordinated in time before something has already happened.

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Speaker 1: The other thing is that the range was just too

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Speaker 1: great for them, because fighter planes are often you know,

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Speaker 1: weighted down with lots of lots of artillery, and they

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Speaker 1: don't have great range. They have a shorter range than

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Speaker 1: plane that's designed to fly long distances, that don't carry

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Speaker 1: a bunch of you know, extra weapons, bombers, you know, guns, whatever. Um.

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Speaker 1: So this is a this is a brand new idea

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Speaker 1: that we're going to take the planes to the battle

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Speaker 1: and and you know, we launch them from there instead

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Speaker 1: of having to kind of you know, keep them far

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Speaker 1: far away and then maybe they'll make it, maybe they won't.

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Speaker 1: If they decide that they can't, you hold out long

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Speaker 1: enough to get there and they'll have to turn back.

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Speaker 1: It's just it was a completely different way of thinking

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Speaker 1: and and it's just such a fascinating time in history

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Speaker 1: when you look back at some of the side notes

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Speaker 1: of all these battles and the way that they were fought.

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Speaker 1: It's just completely different from World War One. Completely different. Well, really,

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Speaker 1: what what had happened was even during the World War

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Speaker 1: One era, the navy navies around the world looked at

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Speaker 1: aircraft carriers again as a means of carrying reconnaissance vehicles.

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Speaker 1: Planes were not terribly useful in warfare, yet at that

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Speaker 1: point they were very useful for finding out where the

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Speaker 1: enemy fleets were so that you could direct your fleets

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Speaker 1: and do the most damage possible. And what what really

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Speaker 1: changed was that you know, you would think of like

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Speaker 1: an aircraft carrier was an escort to a battleship, and

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Speaker 1: the battleships were your your big boys, those were the

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Speaker 1: ones that actually did the damage until the attack on

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Speaker 1: Pearl Harbor. Now, when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, the

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Speaker 1: ships that were uh that were docked at Pearl Harbor

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Speaker 1: were battleships, but the aircraft carriers were out on maneuvers.

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Speaker 1: So the Japanese attack affected the battleships but not the

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Speaker 1: aircraft carriers, which meant that the United States was forced

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Speaker 1: to re evaluate their their strategies and they were forced

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Speaker 1: to use aircraft carriers as weapons as opposed to a

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Speaker 1: means of just reconnaissance. And that's what led to these

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Speaker 1: things like the Battle of the Coral Sea where we

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Speaker 1: end up getting this effect of of of aircraft carriers

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Speaker 1: being used effectively as weapons of war. Well, also, and

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Speaker 1: I think this goes without saying, that the Japanese fleet

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Speaker 1: was launched from an aircraft carrier as well, so that

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Speaker 1: the the the squadrons that attacked Pearl Harbor came from

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Speaker 1: an aircraft carrier that was what several miles off, but

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Speaker 1: you know, stealthily moved in and uh and and and

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Speaker 1: was able to retreat back to the homeland. Right. It

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Speaker 1: was incredibly effective. It was a devastating attack, as we

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Speaker 1: all know. And so this was really what ended up

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Speaker 1: changing the way wars were fought, uh for for several decades.

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Speaker 1: And so it was it was something that that proved

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Speaker 1: the aircraft carrier's importance as a vehicle in in an arsenal. Right,

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Speaker 1: as you just mentioned, you know, the you know, it

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Speaker 1: was that the aircraft carrier was the support vehicle or

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Speaker 1: the yeah, the add on vehicle, the um the chaperone,

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Speaker 1: I guess, right, and then the roles reversed. I mean

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Speaker 1: then it became that you know, the destroyers and the

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Speaker 1: cruisers and all those were um tagging along with the

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Speaker 1: aircraft carrier because that was the big guns. Right, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: you had those there to protect the aircraft carrier, because

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Speaker 1: the aircraft carrier had all the really valuable aircraft on

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Speaker 1: it that could do devastating damage very very quickly. So

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Speaker 1: it was interesting to see such a dramatic shift and

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Speaker 1: it was it was a dramatic shift that, by the way,

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Speaker 1: did not happen smoothly that it took the work of

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Speaker 1: lots of people in the Navy to convince other branches

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Speaker 1: of the military that this, in fact was the best

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Speaker 1: way of going forward. We'll talk a little bit about

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Speaker 1: some of the um interesting battles in the United States

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Speaker 1: that had nothing to do with using weapons or fighting

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Speaker 1: an enemy. It was really the battles being fought between

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Speaker 1: different branches of the military, particularly the Air Force and

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Speaker 1: the Navy. There's a there's a story about the aircraft

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Speaker 1: carrier that wasn't. It was one that was almost but

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Speaker 1: then wasn't. Let's talk a little bit about how these

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Speaker 1: massive and I really do mean massive machines work. Now

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Speaker 1: you have seen one in person, but you've been on

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Speaker 1: the midway. Okay, I've seen one in person. I've never

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Speaker 1: been on one. Yeah, you gotta pack a lunch if

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Speaker 1: you're gonna walk from one side to the other. They

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Speaker 1: are big. They are huge. I mean we're talking like

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Speaker 1: I'm just gonna ballpark. These numbers so sure, we're talking

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Speaker 1: like more than a thousand feet long. The deck is

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Speaker 1: measured in acres, something like four or four acres four

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Speaker 1: and a half acres um. They are like it's like

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Speaker 1: taking a building. I think I read somewhere that it

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Speaker 1: was like, imagine the which building is in New York,

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Speaker 1: the Chrysler building in New York. Tilt the Chrysler building

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Speaker 1: on its side, put it in water, and that's the

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Speaker 1: length of the built of the of the ship. But

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Speaker 1: then even greater than that. It's like it's twenty stories

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Speaker 1: tall when it's floating. Yeah, yeah, it's got it's you know,

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Speaker 1: if you go from the keel of the ship. The

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Speaker 1: keel is the backbone of the ship, the part that's

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Speaker 1: at the very bottom center, all the way to the

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Speaker 1: very top, you're talking like the equivalent of twenty four stories. Amazing.

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Speaker 1: I mean it's it's a huge, huge machine with thousands

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Speaker 1: of parts, two thousands, well billion, a billion parts or

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Speaker 1: something like that is what I read somewhere. I don't

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Speaker 1: know if that's true or not, but I mean they

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Speaker 1: literally said it's a billion parts on on these ships,

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Speaker 1: and it's it's truly like running a city because there

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Speaker 1: are thousands of crew members. We'll talk about numbers when

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Speaker 1: we get to it here, but yeah, there are thousands

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Speaker 1: of people on board and they have to do everything

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Speaker 1: you know, from collecting the garbage to um, making sure

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Speaker 1: that you know, people are fed, and of course fighting

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Speaker 1: the war maybe potentially uh running just you know, doing

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Speaker 1: regular missions. I guess, you know, if they're they're just

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Speaker 1: stationed off the coast of you know, whatever country, they

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Speaker 1: just have to make sure that everything is operating smoothly. Um.

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Speaker 1: There's just every concern you would have with a with

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Speaker 1: a small city is happening on that ship, and there

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Speaker 1: has to be somebody to take care of it. A

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Speaker 1: small city that relies on nuclear power, because that makes

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Speaker 1: it even more complicated. So all modern supercarriers use nuclear

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Speaker 1: power to generate steam. The ones that we talked about

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Speaker 1: today have two nuclear power plants on them, uh that

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Speaker 1: are that's actually different from previous ones. Earlier supercarriers had

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Speaker 1: more nuclear power plants, not fewer, but more because they

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Speaker 1: had a bunch of smaller ones. But there are there

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Speaker 1: are as many as eight, yes, with like four different

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Speaker 1: shafts that steam would go through to turn propellers. So

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Speaker 1: you you generate steam. I mean really, if you talk

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Speaker 1: about old aircraft carriers, you're still talking steam. But in

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Speaker 1: those days that you're talking about a boiler that's being uh,

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Speaker 1: that's being uh heated through using fossil fuels. Today we're

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Speaker 1: talking about using nuclear power to heat up water to

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Speaker 1: turn it to steam. It turns steam steam turbines, which

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Speaker 1: do two things. Two main things. It generates the energy

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Speaker 1: needed to turn the massive propellers. We're talking like more

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Speaker 1: than twenty feet in diameter, right, These are huge propellers

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Speaker 1: that that uh, that propel the ship through the water,

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Speaker 1: and they are used to generate electricity on board the ship.

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Speaker 1: I've got a little bit more info on that if

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Speaker 1: you like, we can talk about it. But I just

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Speaker 1: want to just kind of throw some stuff in here,

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Speaker 1: and you're gonna hear a bunch of notes shuffling, because

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Speaker 1: I got notes every time. This is the first for

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Speaker 1: me because usually I have my computer in here, but

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Speaker 1: actually I'm using the stuff called paper. You go on

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Speaker 1: low tech like, yeah, that's kind of crazy. I do

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Speaker 1: it all the time, low tech, low tech. Alright, So, um,

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Speaker 1: the US Enterprise USS Enterprise was which was built in

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Speaker 1: nineteen fifty eight, actually built between n and nineteen sixty one.

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Speaker 1: This is a big ship. Now, this is an enterprise

347
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Speaker 1: class ship because there was a previous ship that was

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Speaker 1: also known as the U S S Enterprise. And by

349
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Speaker 1: the way, neither of these were the ones that carried

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Speaker 1: Kirk and Spock. Good point. I'm glad. I'm really that

351
00:19:00,160 --> 00:19:02,600
Speaker 1: you pointed that out. Yeah, although I think they did

352
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Speaker 1: visit it and Star Trek for the voyage home. Maybe

353
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Speaker 1: maybe they went because they said, Captain, we've found the

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Speaker 1: vessel and it's the Enterprise. Anyway, Okay, I'm amused by this. Alright,

355
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Speaker 1: So al right, it was in service between nine and

356
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Speaker 1: two thousand and twelve, so it's only recently decommissioned. Um.

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Speaker 1: This was the first, the very first nuclear powered aircraft carrier,

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Speaker 1: and it had eight what they called A two W reactors. Now,

359
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Speaker 1: the A two W. I was wondering what the heck

360
00:19:28,880 --> 00:19:30,840
Speaker 1: that stood for, so I looked it up. UM, it's

361
00:19:30,840 --> 00:19:33,840
Speaker 1: pretty simple. Actually, A is just aircraft carrier. Too. Stands

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Speaker 1: for the second generation designed by that that UM, that

363
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Speaker 1: particular UM designer. I guess that contractor, and W stands

364
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Speaker 1: for Westinghouse and that was the contractor. So A two W.

365
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Speaker 1: So that's the second generation Westinghouse aircraft carrier power source

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Speaker 1: all right, and UM used in Okay, so of course

367
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Speaker 1: it was used in you know the first you know,

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Speaker 1: this is the first nuclear powered and I'm gonna say

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Speaker 1: nuclear nuclear nuclear clear yea, not nuclear nuclear, I might

370
00:20:03,359 --> 00:20:05,840
Speaker 1: say it, but you know, get ready for that. But

371
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Speaker 1: it actually it UM provided power for four propulsion plants.

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Speaker 1: So each each propulsion plant had two reactors that were

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Speaker 1: tied to it. And Okay, according according to the way

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Speaker 1: that it's all laid out, I guess they each powered

375
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Speaker 1: two different chefts. So let's say there's the one A shaft,

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Speaker 1: the one B cheft, the two A shaft, the two

377
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Speaker 1: B scheft, And that's kind of the way it worked, right,

378
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Speaker 1: all right, And I'll try to try to walk through

379
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Speaker 1: this carefully here so we don't miss too much. I

380
00:20:34,080 --> 00:20:37,480
Speaker 1: know it's going to be a simplified version UM. But

381
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Speaker 1: each one of these was capable of of running on

382
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Speaker 1: just one reactor if it had to, but two were

383
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Speaker 1: required for full power. So if they're gonna steam ahead,

384
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Speaker 1: it was a top speed like thirty knots maybe, which

385
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Speaker 1: is about which is about thirty four point. Actually, the

386
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Speaker 1: Navy has been very careful to never divulge the the specifics.

387
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Speaker 1: There were some sources I saw where they said they

388
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Speaker 1: could move in excess of forty knots, which is incredible speed.

389
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Speaker 1: At that speed, you can water ski behind the aircraft

390
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Speaker 1: carrier without skis water ski behind it. I would like

391
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Speaker 1: to try that. That would be kind of exciting. Yeah

392
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Speaker 1: all right, So, um, so you could run on one,

393
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Speaker 1: you know, one reactor per scheft, but they said it

394
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Speaker 1: was you know too are required for full power and

395
00:21:21,840 --> 00:21:24,280
Speaker 1: you know for plane launching capability, which we'll talk about

396
00:21:24,280 --> 00:21:26,880
Speaker 1: why that's important in a little while. Um. Now again

397
00:21:26,960 --> 00:21:29,480
Speaker 1: the simplified version of how these reactors work, if you

398
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Speaker 1: if you want to get into it or not, I

399
00:21:30,960 --> 00:21:34,720
Speaker 1: don't know. Um, it's they're actually fueled by enriched uranium

400
00:21:34,720 --> 00:21:37,879
Speaker 1: two thirty five. And all this is is foreign to me,

401
00:21:38,320 --> 00:21:40,679
Speaker 1: Like that I'm speaking another language, so bear with me.

402
00:21:40,760 --> 00:21:45,040
Speaker 1: But they use um something called halfnium control rods, you know,

403
00:21:45,240 --> 00:21:48,040
Speaker 1: actor and that's how that's how they control, um, just

404
00:21:48,080 --> 00:21:51,520
Speaker 1: how much steam they're creating able to to submerse or

405
00:21:51,640 --> 00:21:55,199
Speaker 1: or pull them out to a level that reaches what

406
00:21:55,240 --> 00:21:58,240
Speaker 1: they're called the criticality point. And I hope I'm saying

407
00:21:58,280 --> 00:22:02,240
Speaker 1: that right. But that's the point which nuclear fission reactors

408
00:22:02,560 --> 00:22:06,080
Speaker 1: reach a place where they're self sustaining. Yes, they create

409
00:22:06,119 --> 00:22:09,960
Speaker 1: their own energy. What's happening is that when when one

410
00:22:10,000 --> 00:22:16,200
Speaker 1: of those atoms decays, it generates some very high energy

411
00:22:16,280 --> 00:22:21,040
Speaker 1: particles which when they collide with other atoms cause them

412
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Speaker 1: to decay, and then you get a self sustaining reaction, which,

413
00:22:25,280 --> 00:22:28,800
Speaker 1: by the way, if you aren't able to contain, becomes

414
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Speaker 1: a meltdown. So so anytime we're talking nuclear power with fission,

415
00:22:33,920 --> 00:22:38,280
Speaker 1: it's a very uh scientific approach, a delicate balance to

416
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Speaker 1: make sure that you have the balance between generating the

417
00:22:41,480 --> 00:22:43,320
Speaker 1: heat you need so that you can create the steam

418
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Speaker 1: you need to turn a turbine and preventing it from

419
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Speaker 1: getting out of control. Yes, and that's part of you

420
00:22:49,080 --> 00:22:51,639
Speaker 1: know why they have these cool down towers and all that, right,

421
00:22:51,680 --> 00:22:54,160
Speaker 1: So their their water cooled and that's where the steam

422
00:22:54,200 --> 00:22:56,639
Speaker 1: is created because of the cooling water that they use

423
00:22:56,720 --> 00:22:59,760
Speaker 1: for these things. So the steam or the the and

424
00:23:00,040 --> 00:23:02,399
Speaker 1: this is again very very simplified because there's a lot

425
00:23:02,440 --> 00:23:05,520
Speaker 1: of processes that happened here. But the steam is sent

426
00:23:05,600 --> 00:23:08,199
Speaker 1: to the main engine area um you know for the

427
00:23:08,200 --> 00:23:12,159
Speaker 1: electrical generators, um their aircraft catapult system and lots of

428
00:23:12,200 --> 00:23:16,240
Speaker 1: other auxiliary features that that they'll talk that they mentioned

429
00:23:16,280 --> 00:23:19,960
Speaker 1: here in this article. Um SO runs just about it.

430
00:23:20,000 --> 00:23:22,320
Speaker 1: Actually it does run everything on board, so anything, I

431
00:23:22,320 --> 00:23:24,760
Speaker 1: mean you flip light switch that's being run by well

432
00:23:24,800 --> 00:23:28,840
Speaker 1: steam power, but from nuclear from a nuclear r Yeah, yeah,

433
00:23:28,880 --> 00:23:32,240
Speaker 1: it's amazing. So the turbines, which are double ended, are

434
00:23:32,240 --> 00:23:34,159
Speaker 1: then caused to spin at a high rate of speed

435
00:23:34,280 --> 00:23:37,240
Speaker 1: from from the steam and the main shaft um which

436
00:23:37,320 --> 00:23:39,560
Speaker 1: which is you know, spinning with a turbine, you know,

437
00:23:39,640 --> 00:23:41,760
Speaker 1: at a very very high rate of speed. It goes

438
00:23:41,800 --> 00:23:44,280
Speaker 1: through a reduction gear which kind of steps down the

439
00:23:44,280 --> 00:23:46,399
Speaker 1: power to a point where they're able to use it

440
00:23:46,440 --> 00:23:49,720
Speaker 1: even to propel the ship. Because those propellers are giant.

441
00:23:49,760 --> 00:23:52,240
Speaker 1: They're like twenty one ft across and there's four of them,

442
00:23:53,080 --> 00:23:56,240
Speaker 1: huge huge screws on these things. And for them to

443
00:23:56,280 --> 00:23:58,280
Speaker 1: even be able to use that power, there's so much

444
00:23:58,359 --> 00:24:00,560
Speaker 1: power there that they have to read us the power

445
00:24:00,560 --> 00:24:02,520
Speaker 1: in order to be able to propel the ship forward. Right,

446
00:24:02,640 --> 00:24:05,960
Speaker 1: I can imagine like what's really important there, at least initially,

447
00:24:06,080 --> 00:24:08,960
Speaker 1: is the torque you gotta create. You gotta create the

448
00:24:09,000 --> 00:24:11,360
Speaker 1: torque necessary to get those things moving. I would think

449
00:24:11,359 --> 00:24:15,399
Speaker 1: it's important. Yes, yeah, let's take a quick break to

450
00:24:15,480 --> 00:24:26,960
Speaker 1: thank our sponsor. Uh So whine go in nuclear power

451
00:24:27,000 --> 00:24:29,879
Speaker 1: in the first place. Well, the big reason is that

452
00:24:29,960 --> 00:24:33,240
Speaker 1: you don't need to refuel for many, many years. Yes,

453
00:24:33,320 --> 00:24:35,480
Speaker 1: no range anxiety. That's what I was. I wrote that

454
00:24:35,520 --> 00:24:37,480
Speaker 1: down here in this when I when I wrote that

455
00:24:37,520 --> 00:24:41,160
Speaker 1: self sustaining part, I wrote down no range anxiety. That's amazing.

456
00:24:41,200 --> 00:24:42,919
Speaker 1: So they can go out and they can spend a

457
00:24:43,000 --> 00:24:45,120
Speaker 1: year out at sea if they want to, two years

458
00:24:45,160 --> 00:24:47,360
Speaker 1: or three years or whatever, and and you know they're

459
00:24:47,400 --> 00:24:49,720
Speaker 1: able to. Now, obviously food would be something that they

460
00:24:49,760 --> 00:24:52,320
Speaker 1: would need. Supplies for water not so much, because they

461
00:24:52,359 --> 00:24:56,359
Speaker 1: have desalination plants. They can actually convert seawater into drinkable water.

462
00:24:57,160 --> 00:25:00,000
Speaker 1: But it does mean that they don't have to refuel

463
00:25:00,400 --> 00:25:03,480
Speaker 1: uh nearly as frequently. When they do refuel, that's a

464
00:25:03,560 --> 00:25:07,040
Speaker 1: multi year process because nuclear fuel is no joke. But

465
00:25:07,680 --> 00:25:13,199
Speaker 1: it they can go decades before needing to refueling. I'm

466
00:25:13,240 --> 00:25:14,720
Speaker 1: gonna say that over and over again. You're gonna be

467
00:25:14,720 --> 00:25:17,200
Speaker 1: saying something. I'm just gonna say, that's incredible. That's amazing.

468
00:25:17,280 --> 00:25:20,960
Speaker 1: And another thing that makes this really uh interesting is

469
00:25:21,000 --> 00:25:23,639
Speaker 1: not from the technological point of view, but from the

470
00:25:23,680 --> 00:25:28,920
Speaker 1: political point of view. Aircraft carriers are considered sovereign territory,

471
00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:31,600
Speaker 1: so as long as that sovereign territory does not venture

472
00:25:31,680 --> 00:25:36,439
Speaker 1: too close to say, a country's borders within it, you

473
00:25:36,480 --> 00:25:40,040
Speaker 1: know that extend out from the coast out a certain

474
00:25:40,080 --> 00:25:42,480
Speaker 1: number of miles into the ocean. As long as the

475
00:25:42,480 --> 00:25:45,320
Speaker 1: aircraft carrier is outside of that, it is technically a

476
00:25:45,359 --> 00:25:49,399
Speaker 1: part of whatever nation owns that aircraft carrier. So in

477
00:25:49,440 --> 00:25:53,080
Speaker 1: the United States sense, you are on US quote unquote

478
00:25:53,119 --> 00:25:55,920
Speaker 1: soil while you're on an aircraft carrier. Even if that

479
00:25:55,960 --> 00:25:59,679
Speaker 1: aircraft carrier is parked way out and you know, in

480
00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:03,920
Speaker 1: in the Middle East or in Asia or wherever, you're

481
00:26:03,960 --> 00:26:06,879
Speaker 1: still on US soil. I like that idea. Yeah, so

482
00:26:06,920 --> 00:26:09,480
Speaker 1: it really is like a floating city, you know, is

483
00:26:09,480 --> 00:26:12,720
Speaker 1: the city itself can actually relocate. Uh. So let's talk

484
00:26:12,720 --> 00:26:14,920
Speaker 1: a little bit about some of the different parts of this.

485
00:26:15,280 --> 00:26:18,760
Speaker 1: We we mentioned that the top deck is the flight deck.

486
00:26:19,560 --> 00:26:22,359
Speaker 1: That is, of course, where all the planes take off

487
00:26:22,400 --> 00:26:25,640
Speaker 1: and land. In the old days, we're talking propeller planes.

488
00:26:25,760 --> 00:26:29,639
Speaker 1: These days were talking jets. Uh. The the design of

489
00:26:29,640 --> 00:26:32,880
Speaker 1: aircraft carriers has had to change dramatically along with the

490
00:26:32,960 --> 00:26:35,520
Speaker 1: evolution of aircraft. And we'll talk more about that when

491
00:26:35,520 --> 00:26:38,879
Speaker 1: I get into the different classes of aircraft. Carriers. One

492
00:26:38,960 --> 00:26:41,640
Speaker 1: of the things that you mentioned, Scott was the steam

493
00:26:41,720 --> 00:26:46,040
Speaker 1: powered catapult, and you guys might be wondering, what is that.

494
00:26:46,040 --> 00:26:48,080
Speaker 1: What do you mean by catapult? Is there like an

495
00:26:48,240 --> 00:26:51,040
Speaker 1: medieval catapult that you put the plane in and it

496
00:26:51,160 --> 00:26:54,320
Speaker 1: launches it? Not quite, no, no, Well, the idea is

497
00:26:54,359 --> 00:26:56,800
Speaker 1: that you know, with with the advent of of jet

498
00:26:56,800 --> 00:26:58,479
Speaker 1: aircraft and the idea that you want to put them

499
00:26:58,480 --> 00:27:01,439
Speaker 1: on a on a boat and launch them. That requires

500
00:27:01,560 --> 00:27:03,919
Speaker 1: a lot of airflow over the surface of the of

501
00:27:03,960 --> 00:27:06,120
Speaker 1: the wing in order for it to get enough lift

502
00:27:06,119 --> 00:27:07,840
Speaker 1: to be able to get off this ship. Right, and

503
00:27:07,880 --> 00:27:10,840
Speaker 1: that and they have a they have a truncated uh

504
00:27:11,280 --> 00:27:14,840
Speaker 1: takeoff strip right because it's they're limited by the length

505
00:27:14,920 --> 00:27:16,840
Speaker 1: of the vessel. And it's not even the full length

506
00:27:16,880 --> 00:27:19,760
Speaker 1: of the vessel, it's it's part of it. So it's

507
00:27:19,800 --> 00:27:23,560
Speaker 1: like basically yeah, So there are two things that aircraft

508
00:27:23,600 --> 00:27:27,639
Speaker 1: carriers do to to improve the ability of jets to

509
00:27:27,720 --> 00:27:31,280
Speaker 1: take off. One is they turn into the wind and

510
00:27:31,320 --> 00:27:33,639
Speaker 1: they go as fast as they can into the wind,

511
00:27:33,680 --> 00:27:37,119
Speaker 1: which generates more airflow. That is so smart, right, You

512
00:27:37,160 --> 00:27:39,840
Speaker 1: don't want to go away because then that reduces airflow.

513
00:27:39,920 --> 00:27:41,840
Speaker 1: So they turn into the wind and they go as

514
00:27:41,840 --> 00:27:44,520
Speaker 1: fast as they can to generate airflow, and then they

515
00:27:44,560 --> 00:27:48,120
Speaker 1: have to find a way to have these jets accelerate

516
00:27:48,440 --> 00:27:50,880
Speaker 1: rapidly so that they can get to a speed where

517
00:27:50,880 --> 00:27:54,240
Speaker 1: they can take off. And that's where this steam catapult

518
00:27:54,280 --> 00:27:56,239
Speaker 1: comes in. And it looks like a slot on the

519
00:27:56,280 --> 00:27:58,520
Speaker 1: deck of the ship and that's all it looks like. Really,

520
00:27:58,680 --> 00:28:00,280
Speaker 1: And if you you know what, I'll be on us

521
00:28:00,320 --> 00:28:02,120
Speaker 1: with you. I think this matches up with a lot

522
00:28:02,119 --> 00:28:05,760
Speaker 1: of the way that they're launching some current roller coasters. Now, oh, yeah,

523
00:28:05,840 --> 00:28:09,280
Speaker 1: you've seen this, Yeah I can't. There's one in um

524
00:28:09,400 --> 00:28:12,400
Speaker 1: see your point in Michigan, I'm sorry, in Ohio, and

525
00:28:12,480 --> 00:28:14,680
Speaker 1: it's called top fuel dragster, I think. And you sit

526
00:28:14,760 --> 00:28:17,560
Speaker 1: on the launch pad and it's going to the roller

527
00:28:17,600 --> 00:28:21,359
Speaker 1: coaster you have. Okay, so it's the same idea. You

528
00:28:21,359 --> 00:28:23,720
Speaker 1: can probably describe it. I mean, it's it's it's steam

529
00:28:23,760 --> 00:28:25,400
Speaker 1: pressure that builds it. And I don't know if it's steam.

530
00:28:25,400 --> 00:28:27,960
Speaker 1: In that case, it builds up pressure in the cylinder

531
00:28:28,200 --> 00:28:31,080
Speaker 1: and you're holding it back. You're you're you're resisting that. Yeah,

532
00:28:31,119 --> 00:28:33,320
Speaker 1: you're allowing that pressure to continue to build. There's a

533
00:28:33,320 --> 00:28:36,960
Speaker 1: piston that's at the end of the cylinder, and behind

534
00:28:37,080 --> 00:28:40,120
Speaker 1: that piston is where you're building up this incredible amount

535
00:28:40,120 --> 00:28:42,720
Speaker 1: of pressure. To keep in mind, the steam is coming

536
00:28:42,800 --> 00:28:45,920
Speaker 1: from the the nuclear power generator. That's what's that's what's

537
00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:49,400
Speaker 1: creating the heat, that's creating the steam, so there's plenty

538
00:28:49,520 --> 00:28:52,120
Speaker 1: of it. There's no shortage of steam here, and you

539
00:28:52,120 --> 00:28:54,080
Speaker 1: just build and build the pressure until you've reached the

540
00:28:54,160 --> 00:28:57,400
Speaker 1: right amount, which by the way, is determined by a

541
00:28:57,520 --> 00:29:00,480
Speaker 1: flight controller and it's based upon the type of aircraft

542
00:29:00,480 --> 00:29:03,480
Speaker 1: that needs to launch and the current deck conditions. Again

543
00:29:03,560 --> 00:29:06,160
Speaker 1: very smart because they found out that you know, uh,

544
00:29:06,240 --> 00:29:08,560
Speaker 1: certain planes require more force to be able to launch

545
00:29:08,600 --> 00:29:10,480
Speaker 1: at a certain speed, and if you don't do it

546
00:29:10,560 --> 00:29:12,400
Speaker 1: hard enough, it's going to go right off into the

547
00:29:12,440 --> 00:29:15,240
Speaker 1: ocean and that's bad news for everybody exactly. So the

548
00:29:15,360 --> 00:29:18,400
Speaker 1: aircraft have what's called a toe bar which connects into

549
00:29:18,640 --> 00:29:21,160
Speaker 1: the shuttle. The shuttle is the element on the aircraft

550
00:29:21,160 --> 00:29:23,640
Speaker 1: carrier that actually moves through the steam ketticle that then

551
00:29:23,680 --> 00:29:27,360
Speaker 1: accelerates at this incredible rate. The pistons, there's actually a

552
00:29:27,360 --> 00:29:30,360
Speaker 1: pair of them, so there's cylinder on either side that

553
00:29:30,480 --> 00:29:34,360
Speaker 1: connect to this this shuttle. The toebar hooks in uh,

554
00:29:34,400 --> 00:29:37,160
Speaker 1: and the toe bar is connected to the nose of

555
00:29:37,200 --> 00:29:39,680
Speaker 1: the aircraft. Yeah, the wheels up front, and there's also

556
00:29:39,960 --> 00:29:42,840
Speaker 1: something called a hold back which they fastened between the

557
00:29:42,880 --> 00:29:45,960
Speaker 1: back of the wheel and shuttle. Um. And the whole

558
00:29:46,000 --> 00:29:49,040
Speaker 1: back is was does just what it says, it holds

559
00:29:49,120 --> 00:29:51,360
Speaker 1: back the jet because one of the other things you

560
00:29:51,400 --> 00:29:53,840
Speaker 1: have to do, let's turn on those jet engines. Yeah,

561
00:29:53,880 --> 00:29:56,720
Speaker 1: this is interesting because they do raise something that big

562
00:29:56,760 --> 00:29:59,920
Speaker 1: platform behind it that raises up behind the the airplane.

563
00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:02,160
Speaker 1: Can picture this. It's almost like a wall that stands

564
00:30:02,240 --> 00:30:04,600
Speaker 1: up behind the plane. And what that does is it's

565
00:30:04,640 --> 00:30:07,000
Speaker 1: a it's just a jet blast deflector in fact, it's

566
00:30:07,040 --> 00:30:09,640
Speaker 1: what they call it. And that just doesn't allow you know,

567
00:30:09,680 --> 00:30:12,800
Speaker 1: somebody get blown overboard, you know, behind them when you know,

568
00:30:12,840 --> 00:30:15,920
Speaker 1: you go full throttle on F A teen or whatever exactly. Yeah,

569
00:30:15,920 --> 00:30:19,320
Speaker 1: So so that that launches up and just before launch,

570
00:30:19,400 --> 00:30:21,120
Speaker 1: I mean they're you know, they're checking everything, they're all

571
00:30:21,240 --> 00:30:23,160
Speaker 1: they getting all the signals for the go and everything,

572
00:30:23,760 --> 00:30:28,040
Speaker 1: and the pilot has to go full throttle while he's

573
00:30:28,040 --> 00:30:31,400
Speaker 1: still attached to the shuttle via the toe bar and

574
00:30:31,440 --> 00:30:33,640
Speaker 1: the whole back is still in place. He's going full

575
00:30:33,680 --> 00:30:35,680
Speaker 1: throttle and then they give the and then they finally

576
00:30:35,720 --> 00:30:38,880
Speaker 1: give the the go I guess for the Shuttle to

577
00:30:38,880 --> 00:30:42,760
Speaker 1: to launch, and that's what catapults the the aircraft off

578
00:30:42,800 --> 00:30:44,480
Speaker 1: the end of the plane, off the end of the deck.

579
00:30:44,840 --> 00:30:49,160
Speaker 1: Essentially say release the so that the pressure can push

580
00:30:49,200 --> 00:30:52,160
Speaker 1: the pistons forward. That so the in a in a way,

581
00:30:52,240 --> 00:30:55,440
Speaker 1: the you know, the plane is being towed, that's why

582
00:30:55,440 --> 00:30:57,640
Speaker 1: you call it the toe bar by the Shuttle at

583
00:30:57,640 --> 00:31:00,560
Speaker 1: an incredible speed. When it gets to the end, it

584
00:31:00,640 --> 00:31:04,440
Speaker 1: can then take off and fly off into the great

585
00:31:04,440 --> 00:31:08,440
Speaker 1: Blue yonder hopefully. Yeah. Uh, if everything has gone well.

586
00:31:08,680 --> 00:31:11,920
Speaker 1: And this was the Shuttle technology again was pioneered by

587
00:31:11,960 --> 00:31:13,960
Speaker 1: the British, and you know what, just to give you

588
00:31:13,960 --> 00:31:15,800
Speaker 1: an idea of how strong this is and you get

589
00:31:15,800 --> 00:31:17,160
Speaker 1: back to the British in just a second, but this

590
00:31:17,240 --> 00:31:19,600
Speaker 1: is a really strong system. And we're talking about steam

591
00:31:19,600 --> 00:31:21,520
Speaker 1: and you might think it's not all that that forceful,

592
00:31:21,600 --> 00:31:23,880
Speaker 1: but or maybe you do. I don't know, but it

593
00:31:23,960 --> 00:31:27,120
Speaker 1: takes a forty five thousand pound plane from zero to

594
00:31:27,160 --> 00:31:31,000
Speaker 1: one hundred and sixty five miles per hour in two seconds. Yeah,

595
00:31:31,040 --> 00:31:34,600
Speaker 1: that's that's faster than a Tesla two seconds. Yeah, that's

596
00:31:34,640 --> 00:31:37,560
Speaker 1: considerably fast. It's not quite as fast as the top

597
00:31:37,560 --> 00:31:42,560
Speaker 1: fuel Dragster, but which is pretty By the way, it's

598
00:31:42,560 --> 00:31:46,400
Speaker 1: a it's an intense roller coaster. H two times I

599
00:31:46,440 --> 00:31:48,440
Speaker 1: wrote that. Yeah, I wasn't even think of that. I

600
00:31:48,480 --> 00:31:50,680
Speaker 1: think of the real deal, the real the real car.

601
00:31:51,080 --> 00:31:53,000
Speaker 1: And I've heard, you know, I've talked to guys that

602
00:31:53,120 --> 00:31:54,960
Speaker 1: drive those top fuel drexters that kind of look like

603
00:31:55,040 --> 00:31:57,840
Speaker 1: long rails, you know, the really the thirty ft long

604
00:31:57,840 --> 00:32:00,000
Speaker 1: ones or whatever the length is. They said, it feel

605
00:32:00,120 --> 00:32:02,640
Speaker 1: like you're sitting in a stoplight and a semi hits

606
00:32:02,640 --> 00:32:05,640
Speaker 1: you from behind at about two miles. That's what it

607
00:32:05,640 --> 00:32:07,880
Speaker 1: feels like when those things launched. So that's got to

608
00:32:07,920 --> 00:32:10,080
Speaker 1: be exactly what the pilots feel when they launch off

609
00:32:10,080 --> 00:32:12,440
Speaker 1: of a deck of an aircraft carrier. It's it's even

610
00:32:12,480 --> 00:32:15,320
Speaker 1: more exhilarating than a standard if you can call it that,

611
00:32:15,440 --> 00:32:18,720
Speaker 1: a standard runway takeoff, because they have so much greater

612
00:32:18,800 --> 00:32:22,480
Speaker 1: distance and a much greater amount of time to be

613
00:32:22,520 --> 00:32:25,680
Speaker 1: able to get up to speed, right, greater margin of

614
00:32:25,720 --> 00:32:28,800
Speaker 1: area to suppose, uh speaking, a margin of error is

615
00:32:28,840 --> 00:32:32,760
Speaker 1: something that uh you have, you have very low margin

616
00:32:32,840 --> 00:32:36,760
Speaker 1: of error is landing on an aircraft carrier. Oh yeah, okay,

617
00:32:36,760 --> 00:32:39,520
Speaker 1: that's another really interesting aspect of this whole thing is

618
00:32:39,560 --> 00:32:41,560
Speaker 1: that you know, and it took him a couple of

619
00:32:41,640 --> 00:32:44,200
Speaker 1: months to figure out initially, remember said they were thinking

620
00:32:44,240 --> 00:32:48,960
Speaker 1: about it, but it's become even more complex with jets. Yeah. So. Uh.

621
00:32:49,080 --> 00:32:53,280
Speaker 1: The idea of the method that the main method is

622
00:32:53,400 --> 00:32:55,920
Speaker 1: used to stop aircraft, to help aircraft come to a

623
00:32:55,960 --> 00:32:58,200
Speaker 1: stop when they land on an aircraft carrier, dates back

624
00:32:58,200 --> 00:33:01,560
Speaker 1: to the propeller plane days, but it has become increasingly

625
00:33:01,640 --> 00:33:05,560
Speaker 1: important in the jet world. As you were pointing out, Scott, Uh,

626
00:33:05,640 --> 00:33:10,040
Speaker 1: and it's using a tailhook. The tailhook is just what

627
00:33:10,160 --> 00:33:12,560
Speaker 1: it sounds like. You have the tail of your aircraft.

628
00:33:13,000 --> 00:33:17,600
Speaker 1: There is a hook that descends down that can hook

629
00:33:17,760 --> 00:33:22,760
Speaker 1: onto something. In this case, we're talking about arresting wires.

630
00:33:23,200 --> 00:33:27,960
Speaker 1: These are very thick cables that stretch across the width

631
00:33:28,160 --> 00:33:32,920
Speaker 1: of the landing area of the flight deck, and your

632
00:33:32,960 --> 00:33:37,440
Speaker 1: goal as a pilot is to hit a specific arresting people.

633
00:33:37,440 --> 00:33:40,200
Speaker 1: They're there. In older ships there's a series of four,

634
00:33:40,240 --> 00:33:43,080
Speaker 1: and more modern ones there are only three. So with

635
00:33:43,160 --> 00:33:45,880
Speaker 1: the older ships you were told to hit the third one. Now,

636
00:33:46,000 --> 00:33:47,840
Speaker 1: isn't this strange? Now, this is the first time that

637
00:33:47,920 --> 00:33:49,880
Speaker 1: I had ever heard this when I was reading this article.

638
00:33:50,200 --> 00:33:52,000
Speaker 1: This is the house Stuff Works article that we're looking

639
00:33:52,040 --> 00:33:54,960
Speaker 1: at here. The goal is to hit the third wire

640
00:33:55,040 --> 00:33:57,720
Speaker 1: in the set, and it's the safest, most effective wire

641
00:33:57,720 --> 00:34:00,760
Speaker 1: to hit. Now, I was thinking, why, why is it

642
00:34:00,840 --> 00:34:03,080
Speaker 1: any worse than I can understand maybe not wanting to

643
00:34:03,160 --> 00:34:04,600
Speaker 1: hit the first one because it's too close to the

644
00:34:04,680 --> 00:34:06,520
Speaker 1: edge and get that. And the last one is kind

645
00:34:06,560 --> 00:34:08,440
Speaker 1: of a you better hit it or else you're going

646
00:34:08,440 --> 00:34:11,279
Speaker 1: over the edge. Um, but why not the second or

647
00:34:11,320 --> 00:34:13,120
Speaker 1: the third? I guess the third just shows some kind

648
00:34:13,160 --> 00:34:17,360
Speaker 1: of precision. Yeah. Well, and and if you were able

649
00:34:17,400 --> 00:34:20,319
Speaker 1: to consistently hit that third one, it would show that

650
00:34:20,400 --> 00:34:25,000
Speaker 1: you were a particularly skilled pilot, and thus you would

651
00:34:25,120 --> 00:34:27,880
Speaker 1: rise up the ranks more quickly because you were showing

652
00:34:27,920 --> 00:34:30,640
Speaker 1: that you had the precision, the skill, and the concern

653
00:34:30,800 --> 00:34:35,000
Speaker 1: necessary to continue in this. If you were not consistently

654
00:34:35,040 --> 00:34:38,640
Speaker 1: hitting it, you might not be flying that much longer. Yeah,

655
00:34:38,640 --> 00:34:40,279
Speaker 1: I think that's what it's all about, though, I think

656
00:34:40,280 --> 00:34:41,960
Speaker 1: it's I think it's all about, you know, just being

657
00:34:41,960 --> 00:34:45,759
Speaker 1: able to have uh Navy bragging rights you can hit

658
00:34:45,800 --> 00:34:47,480
Speaker 1: the third wire every single time. What do you think

659
00:34:47,640 --> 00:34:51,600
Speaker 1: maybe maybe in the more current ones, the more modern

660
00:34:51,640 --> 00:34:53,759
Speaker 1: ones where there's only three wires, you're supposed to hit

661
00:34:53,760 --> 00:34:56,319
Speaker 1: the second one. So again you're aiming for the one

662
00:34:56,400 --> 00:34:59,719
Speaker 1: the middle one, not the one on either end. Uh. Yeah.

663
00:34:59,760 --> 00:35:02,279
Speaker 1: And so what these wires do is they're actually connected

664
00:35:02,600 --> 00:35:07,719
Speaker 1: to giant hydraulic systems, and so when the the aircraft

665
00:35:07,840 --> 00:35:11,040
Speaker 1: hooks won the wires, it obviously starts to pull on

666
00:35:11,120 --> 00:35:15,279
Speaker 1: that wire. The hydraulics act as sort of a breaking mechanism. Now,

667
00:35:15,320 --> 00:35:18,480
Speaker 1: when you watch one of these aircraft land, it looks

668
00:35:18,520 --> 00:35:21,960
Speaker 1: like it stops almost immediately. What's actually happening is that

669
00:35:22,320 --> 00:35:25,440
Speaker 1: it's not just a taught wire that's attached to like

670
00:35:25,520 --> 00:35:29,359
Speaker 1: anchored down to two stationary points, because that would very

671
00:35:29,440 --> 00:35:32,880
Speaker 1: likely cause damage to the aircraft or to the aircraft

672
00:35:32,920 --> 00:35:36,680
Speaker 1: carrier both and it could the person. Yet the human

673
00:35:36,719 --> 00:35:41,160
Speaker 1: beings to stop immediately. Yeah, And there's lots of footage,

674
00:35:41,560 --> 00:35:47,399
Speaker 1: tragic footage of aircraft that were unable to stop, uh,

675
00:35:47,719 --> 00:35:51,800
Speaker 1: including ones where they had not yet started using arresting wires.

676
00:35:52,200 --> 00:35:54,959
Speaker 1: And you see, uh, like there's I saw one where

677
00:35:54,960 --> 00:35:58,920
Speaker 1: it not only did skid continuously down the landing strip,

678
00:35:59,000 --> 00:36:01,520
Speaker 1: it collided with the aircraft that were further down the

679
00:36:01,520 --> 00:36:05,840
Speaker 1: aircraft carrier. You're talking about prop planes, Yeah, super dangerous,

680
00:36:05,960 --> 00:36:09,400
Speaker 1: uh stuff. In fact, um, there's a there's an article

681
00:36:09,480 --> 00:36:12,760
Speaker 1: I read called several Reasons Why Aircraft Carriers are Super

682
00:36:12,840 --> 00:36:17,400
Speaker 1: Dangerous by Sam Lagron who worked in the Naval Institute,

683
00:36:18,400 --> 00:36:23,319
Speaker 1: and uh he talked about how how how precise you

684
00:36:23,320 --> 00:36:27,120
Speaker 1: had to be, how closely these things could uh come

685
00:36:27,160 --> 00:36:31,520
Speaker 1: between you know, success and failure, and it's pretty terrifying.

686
00:36:31,560 --> 00:36:35,200
Speaker 1: It actually mentions that that if you were flying some

687
00:36:35,239 --> 00:36:38,400
Speaker 1: of the larger aircraft like the Navy's E two Hawkeye.

688
00:36:38,960 --> 00:36:43,200
Speaker 1: Let's say that you don't hit that third cable and

689
00:36:43,239 --> 00:36:45,000
Speaker 1: you don't hit the fourth cable. What you have to

690
00:36:45,040 --> 00:36:48,000
Speaker 1: do then is you have to throttle up full speed

691
00:36:48,080 --> 00:36:51,480
Speaker 1: so that you can fly up and then come back

692
00:36:51,520 --> 00:36:54,400
Speaker 1: around and try again. Can I tell you something, I

693
00:36:54,440 --> 00:36:56,600
Speaker 1: think that even if you hit that third wire, or

694
00:36:56,640 --> 00:36:58,560
Speaker 1: you hit the second wire, the first wire, I think

695
00:36:58,600 --> 00:37:01,120
Speaker 1: you still go full throughout. Yeah. Um. This is which

696
00:37:01,120 --> 00:37:02,960
Speaker 1: is so weird because you would think that Okay, it's

697
00:37:03,000 --> 00:37:05,680
Speaker 1: it's snagged, it's it's secure, But they don't know that yet.

698
00:37:05,719 --> 00:37:07,279
Speaker 1: They don't know if it's gonna skip over it, if

699
00:37:07,280 --> 00:37:09,680
Speaker 1: it's gonna if it's got a tenuous grasp on itt

700
00:37:09,680 --> 00:37:11,799
Speaker 1: that you know, it's gonna let go. Um. So they're

701
00:37:11,800 --> 00:37:14,600
Speaker 1: they're trained that when that contact is made, even though

702
00:37:14,600 --> 00:37:16,960
Speaker 1: you feel a grab, you still go full throttle, just

703
00:37:17,000 --> 00:37:20,040
Speaker 1: for a brief second, just in case, because that's your

704
00:37:20,120 --> 00:37:22,320
Speaker 1: last chance. Otherwise, if you're going over the edge slow,

705
00:37:22,800 --> 00:37:24,920
Speaker 1: you better hit the ejector because that's your only way

706
00:37:24,960 --> 00:37:26,640
Speaker 1: out because these otherwise you're going in the train. Yea,

707
00:37:26,680 --> 00:37:30,080
Speaker 1: and it always ends up upside down. Yeah, so, uh,

708
00:37:30,440 --> 00:37:34,440
Speaker 1: you know the the the standard procedure is that you

709
00:37:34,480 --> 00:37:36,239
Speaker 1: need to take off again. It's called you know, you're

710
00:37:36,440 --> 00:37:38,080
Speaker 1: you have to be you have to be a bolter.

711
00:37:38,400 --> 00:37:41,480
Speaker 1: You have to bolt a bolter. Yeah, they're calling bolters

712
00:37:41,480 --> 00:37:44,600
Speaker 1: where you you end up having to take back off again. Well,

713
00:37:44,640 --> 00:37:47,560
Speaker 1: here's the thing. Depending on the size of the aircraft,

714
00:37:47,760 --> 00:37:50,480
Speaker 1: you might not have a very large margin of error.

715
00:37:50,520 --> 00:37:53,280
Speaker 1: For example, the Navy's E two Hawkeye, the width margin

716
00:37:53,400 --> 00:37:59,400
Speaker 1: of error can be a foot twelve inches of whether like,

717
00:37:59,520 --> 00:38:02,960
Speaker 1: you have at twelve inches of space to throttle up

718
00:38:03,120 --> 00:38:06,120
Speaker 1: before you are not going to be fast enough to

719
00:38:06,160 --> 00:38:10,920
Speaker 1: get take off again and again. Yeah twelve and well,

720
00:38:10,960 --> 00:38:13,440
Speaker 1: I mean it is incredible. You think about the amazing

721
00:38:14,239 --> 00:38:18,839
Speaker 1: uh skill and encourage it takes to handle this kind

722
00:38:18,880 --> 00:38:22,040
Speaker 1: of aircraft. Another interesting thing is that there was a

723
00:38:22,040 --> 00:38:27,600
Speaker 1: development that made this easier early aircraft. Imagine that you've

724
00:38:27,600 --> 00:38:30,000
Speaker 1: got like a two by four, all right, and then

725
00:38:30,040 --> 00:38:32,799
Speaker 1: you've got a ruler that's not as wide as your

726
00:38:32,880 --> 00:38:35,600
Speaker 1: two by four, and you lay the ruler down and

727
00:38:35,640 --> 00:38:39,280
Speaker 1: the ruler represents the the landing strip on your aircraft carrier.

728
00:38:39,360 --> 00:38:42,040
Speaker 1: Nee the two by four itself is just barely longer

729
00:38:42,080 --> 00:38:45,520
Speaker 1: than the ruler. Uh. And and so those were the

730
00:38:45,520 --> 00:38:47,920
Speaker 1: early aircraft carriers. Right. You had just kind of a

731
00:38:48,040 --> 00:38:51,279
Speaker 1: straight strip that was where you would land and take off,

732
00:38:51,600 --> 00:38:53,520
Speaker 1: and it will also be where you're you would be

733
00:38:53,600 --> 00:38:56,960
Speaker 1: mustering your aircraft, uh, which means that there were a

734
00:38:56,960 --> 00:39:00,960
Speaker 1: lot of potential places where you could have collisions if

735
00:39:01,000 --> 00:39:03,759
Speaker 1: things did not go well. The British came up with

736
00:39:03,800 --> 00:39:07,919
Speaker 1: a brilliant way of getting around this. They decided to

737
00:39:07,960 --> 00:39:12,799
Speaker 1: tilt the landing strip by fourteen degrees so that it

738
00:39:12,840 --> 00:39:16,040
Speaker 1: was not a you know, it didn't go the length

739
00:39:16,160 --> 00:39:18,799
Speaker 1: of the ship. And by tilt, I don't mean that

740
00:39:18,960 --> 00:39:22,680
Speaker 1: it was tilted on uh like, it wasn't like a

741
00:39:22,800 --> 00:39:28,000
Speaker 1: cantid surface. No, it was just it was just instead

742
00:39:28,000 --> 00:39:30,440
Speaker 1: of it being a straight road, imagine that you just

743
00:39:30,680 --> 00:39:34,480
Speaker 1: turned that it's off the line of the keel exactly.

744
00:39:34,920 --> 00:39:37,120
Speaker 1: So that meant that you could you could have a

745
00:39:37,239 --> 00:39:40,200
Speaker 1: mustering area for aircraft that was not directly in the

746
00:39:40,239 --> 00:39:43,400
Speaker 1: path of where aircraft were landing. The British were the

747
00:39:43,400 --> 00:39:45,040
Speaker 1: ones who came up with that. The British were the

748
00:39:45,040 --> 00:39:47,120
Speaker 1: ones who came up with the arresting wires, and then

749
00:39:47,200 --> 00:39:50,279
Speaker 1: the United States and other nations said, this is a

750
00:39:50,320 --> 00:39:54,239
Speaker 1: really good idea that we are going to also employ. Yeah, yeah,

751
00:39:54,360 --> 00:39:57,920
Speaker 1: ways of making something that is, no matter how you

752
00:39:57,920 --> 00:40:01,520
Speaker 1: slice it, incredibly dangerous less. So you know, there's some

753
00:40:01,640 --> 00:40:03,680
Speaker 1: that even have a almost like I think they call

754
00:40:03,719 --> 00:40:06,040
Speaker 1: a ski jump at the end. It looks like a ramp.

755
00:40:06,080 --> 00:40:08,120
Speaker 1: It ramps up at the end so that you get

756
00:40:08,120 --> 00:40:10,440
Speaker 1: just that little bit more of a lift at the end.

757
00:40:10,480 --> 00:40:13,520
Speaker 1: I suppose put you in the right direction, I would imagine.

758
00:40:13,520 --> 00:40:16,120
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, and I've also seen ones like you know,

759
00:40:16,160 --> 00:40:20,239
Speaker 1: they had other methods of trying to uh capture aircraft

760
00:40:20,280 --> 00:40:23,760
Speaker 1: that might not have um have hit the arresting wires

761
00:40:23,800 --> 00:40:26,520
Speaker 1: just right, including things like giant nets that would help

762
00:40:26,560 --> 00:40:29,799
Speaker 1: slow down aircraft which sometimes worked and sometimes didn't. It

763
00:40:29,800 --> 00:40:31,880
Speaker 1: seems like that would bring its own problems. Yeah, to

764
00:40:31,920 --> 00:40:34,160
Speaker 1: illustrate how dangerous this is again going back to that

765
00:40:34,239 --> 00:40:40,799
Speaker 1: several reasons article I mentioned, um Lagron quotes a statistic

766
00:40:40,840 --> 00:40:45,920
Speaker 1: that really is eye opening. Between nineteen forty eight and nine,

767
00:40:47,640 --> 00:40:50,880
Speaker 1: the number of US sailors and marines that died in

768
00:40:51,000 --> 00:40:55,920
Speaker 1: and around aircraft carriers was eight thousand, five hundred in

769
00:40:56,000 --> 00:40:58,520
Speaker 1: forty years. Eight thousand, five hundred people dying. Now that

770
00:40:58,560 --> 00:41:01,919
Speaker 1: includes that includes combat, but that actually makes a much

771
00:41:02,040 --> 00:41:07,000
Speaker 1: smaller number than accidents, no kidding. Yeah, So okay, I

772
00:41:07,040 --> 00:41:09,000
Speaker 1: can I can mention a couple of accidents if you

773
00:41:09,080 --> 00:41:10,759
Speaker 1: want me to check about them. All right. So during

774
00:41:10,800 --> 00:41:13,359
Speaker 1: the nineteen sixties there was kind of a bleak time

775
00:41:13,400 --> 00:41:16,480
Speaker 1: for the U. S. Navy. They suffered three fires aboard

776
00:41:16,480 --> 00:41:19,799
Speaker 1: aircraft carriers in the nineteen sixties, and these you can

777
00:41:20,040 --> 00:41:22,160
Speaker 1: what's interesting about this is you can go back and

778
00:41:22,200 --> 00:41:24,080
Speaker 1: look at these, you can look at photographs because they

779
00:41:24,080 --> 00:41:26,760
Speaker 1: were you know, filmed in a lot of cases, um,

780
00:41:26,880 --> 00:41:30,799
Speaker 1: and they use these these disasters as training films for

781
00:41:31,040 --> 00:41:34,239
Speaker 1: current military members on aircraft, what what not to do?

782
00:41:34,320 --> 00:41:36,160
Speaker 1: And what to do because they got a little better

783
00:41:36,200 --> 00:41:38,480
Speaker 1: at it here. But UM going back to and I'll

784
00:41:38,520 --> 00:41:41,239
Speaker 1: just listen these kind of quickly, but just off the

785
00:41:41,239 --> 00:41:44,799
Speaker 1: coast of Vietnam in nineteen sixty six, on October twenty six,

786
00:41:45,400 --> 00:41:48,719
Speaker 1: the USS or riskin e UM c v A thirty four,

787
00:41:48,760 --> 00:41:52,880
Speaker 1: if you're interested in that designation, the hull designation UM.

788
00:41:52,920 --> 00:41:54,560
Speaker 1: There are a couple of guys that were loading some

789
00:41:54,640 --> 00:41:57,520
Speaker 1: flares into a locker below deck and one of the

790
00:41:57,560 --> 00:42:01,080
Speaker 1: flares went off and there were six ridden fifty other

791
00:42:01,160 --> 00:42:04,080
Speaker 1: flares in the locker they were loading and the guy,

792
00:42:04,480 --> 00:42:06,040
Speaker 1: I don't know if he panicked or what, but when

793
00:42:06,040 --> 00:42:07,640
Speaker 1: the flare went off, he shut the door real quick.

794
00:42:07,680 --> 00:42:10,160
Speaker 1: He didn't try to grab that one flare out and

795
00:42:10,520 --> 00:42:13,680
Speaker 1: the result was a I think it was like a

796
00:42:13,760 --> 00:42:16,719
Speaker 1: huge fire that killed something like forty four men forty

797
00:42:16,760 --> 00:42:19,440
Speaker 1: four crew members on board. So that was there was

798
00:42:19,480 --> 00:42:22,239
Speaker 1: extensive damage to the ship UM. And then just a

799
00:42:22,320 --> 00:42:24,960
Speaker 1: year later, in July of nineteen sixty seven, again off

800
00:42:24,960 --> 00:42:30,439
Speaker 1: the coast of Vietnam, UH, the USS forest all this one. Yeah,

801
00:42:30,480 --> 00:42:33,799
Speaker 1: this is now. This was an accidental rocket deployment UM

802
00:42:33,880 --> 00:42:36,279
Speaker 1: that slammed into a parked A four that was on

803
00:42:36,320 --> 00:42:39,000
Speaker 1: the deck, and then that spread to other aircraft on

804
00:42:39,040 --> 00:42:41,719
Speaker 1: the deck, and you know, of course bombs began to

805
00:42:41,760 --> 00:42:43,520
Speaker 1: explode all over the place. On top of that, you

806
00:42:43,560 --> 00:42:45,719
Speaker 1: can imagine what's going on. This is this is a

807
00:42:45,840 --> 00:42:50,240
Speaker 1: thirteen hour fire. The crew that killed one and thirty

808
00:42:50,239 --> 00:42:52,839
Speaker 1: four crew members. That was huge fire. There were there

809
00:42:52,840 --> 00:42:55,040
Speaker 1: were twenty one aircraft destroyed during this one. And this

810
00:42:55,080 --> 00:42:56,759
Speaker 1: one is the one that I think they used as

811
00:42:57,120 --> 00:42:59,839
Speaker 1: the training film of what can go wrong. And then

812
00:42:59,840 --> 00:43:02,520
Speaker 1: in nineteen sixty nine to kind of round out the

813
00:43:02,920 --> 00:43:06,160
Speaker 1: decade with another disaster, here, uh, the U. S. S. Enterprise,

814
00:43:06,320 --> 00:43:11,319
Speaker 1: you know, the first nuclear powered UM carrier had us

815
00:43:11,360 --> 00:43:15,040
Speaker 1: at a terrible fire as well. UM similar to the

816
00:43:15,080 --> 00:43:18,120
Speaker 1: forest All fire, UM, but this was a rocket that

817
00:43:18,160 --> 00:43:20,680
Speaker 1: ignited and hit another aircraft and you know, due to

818
00:43:20,719 --> 00:43:22,600
Speaker 1: exhaust heat I think is what set this one off.

819
00:43:23,160 --> 00:43:25,040
Speaker 1: But it took four hours to extinguish that one. In

820
00:43:25,560 --> 00:43:28,400
Speaker 1: twenty eight crew members were killed during that and fifteen

821
00:43:28,560 --> 00:43:32,319
Speaker 1: aircraft were destroyed. So they had their fair share of

822
00:43:32,680 --> 00:43:36,000
Speaker 1: you know, hard knocks in nineteen sixty in nineteen sixties,

823
00:43:36,680 --> 00:43:39,120
Speaker 1: throughout the whole decade, and I know that you know,

824
00:43:39,200 --> 00:43:41,960
Speaker 1: safety has improved over the over the decades, but there's

825
00:43:42,000 --> 00:43:44,480
Speaker 1: probably still a lot of small things that happened on

826
00:43:44,520 --> 00:43:48,000
Speaker 1: board apparently. I mean, if eight thousand people have died

827
00:43:48,040 --> 00:43:50,759
Speaker 1: on these these are dangerous places to be, yeah, I mean,

828
00:43:50,880 --> 00:43:54,239
Speaker 1: well even if like there can be things that have

829
00:43:54,480 --> 00:43:58,360
Speaker 1: nothing to do with the the flight deck or the

830
00:43:58,400 --> 00:44:02,120
Speaker 1: hangar or the aircraft or in the weaponry. Even I mean,

831
00:44:02,160 --> 00:44:06,120
Speaker 1: you're just talking about a confined environment where you have

832
00:44:06,239 --> 00:44:12,040
Speaker 1: several thousand people existing there, there are plenty of opportunities

833
00:44:12,080 --> 00:44:15,160
Speaker 1: for accidents that you know, there's same sort of accidents

834
00:44:15,160 --> 00:44:17,879
Speaker 1: that you could encounter in any other environment. So the

835
00:44:17,960 --> 00:44:20,239
Speaker 1: figures that I mentioned, you know, not all of those

836
00:44:20,239 --> 00:44:23,280
Speaker 1: were necessarily the result of some sort of catastrophic accident

837
00:44:23,360 --> 00:44:25,719
Speaker 1: like the ones we've been talking about, but it does

838
00:44:25,840 --> 00:44:30,160
Speaker 1: illustrate that this is an environment that that is by

839
00:44:30,200 --> 00:44:32,560
Speaker 1: its very nature dangerous. Yeah, I mean you could fall

840
00:44:32,560 --> 00:44:34,480
Speaker 1: and bump your head, you can choke on something in

841
00:44:34,520 --> 00:44:38,080
Speaker 1: the yeah, exactly right, and and stuff like that. You'd

842
00:44:38,120 --> 00:44:41,280
Speaker 1: fall overboard. A friend of mine served in the Navy.

843
00:44:41,320 --> 00:44:43,520
Speaker 1: He didn't serve a board and aircraft carrier, but one

844
00:44:43,520 --> 00:44:46,120
Speaker 1: of the one of the descriptions he gave me, I

845
00:44:46,400 --> 00:44:49,600
Speaker 1: imagined there were probably lots of bumps and bruises whenever

846
00:44:50,120 --> 00:44:54,840
Speaker 1: SE's got particularly rough. Because he talked about how, uh,

847
00:44:54,960 --> 00:44:58,520
Speaker 1: if you're going above or below whatever deck you're on

848
00:44:59,160 --> 00:45:01,600
Speaker 1: in a ship, we call them decks. They're not floors.

849
00:45:02,719 --> 00:45:04,600
Speaker 1: So if you're on a deck and you need to

850
00:45:04,680 --> 00:45:08,320
Speaker 1: go up or down, you you climb what is almost

851
00:45:08,480 --> 00:45:12,279
Speaker 1: a ladder. The the they are sets of stairs technically,

852
00:45:12,320 --> 00:45:18,040
Speaker 1: but they are so steep that it's practically a ladder exactly.

853
00:45:18,400 --> 00:45:23,000
Speaker 1: And if the seas are really really rough, the world

854
00:45:23,040 --> 00:45:25,759
Speaker 1: around you is moving, And he talked about how, yeah,

855
00:45:25,760 --> 00:45:28,040
Speaker 1: there were times where he would start to climb and

856
00:45:28,120 --> 00:45:31,080
Speaker 1: because of the way the ship would roll, he would

857
00:45:31,160 --> 00:45:33,600
Speaker 1: end up being at the top of the stairs way

858
00:45:33,640 --> 00:45:36,719
Speaker 1: faster than he had anticipated. Like he would take a

859
00:45:36,880 --> 00:45:39,440
Speaker 1: step and then the ship would roll as he was stepping.

860
00:45:39,480 --> 00:45:41,120
Speaker 1: And it's kind of like when you would jump on

861
00:45:41,160 --> 00:45:46,160
Speaker 1: a trampoline just right, Yeah, you suddenly end up much

862
00:45:46,280 --> 00:45:49,880
Speaker 1: higher up than you expected. Um, yeah, it could be

863
00:45:49,920 --> 00:45:53,560
Speaker 1: actually terrifying. I have I have one really cool story

864
00:45:53,600 --> 00:45:55,920
Speaker 1: of an accident that was averted by someone who was

865
00:45:56,000 --> 00:46:01,600
Speaker 1: in a different accident that was the thankfully tragedy was

866
00:46:01,640 --> 00:46:05,320
Speaker 1: also averted this guy just had the best luck. Captain

867
00:46:05,560 --> 00:46:09,520
Speaker 1: Jim Lovell this. If the name sounds familiar, it's probably

868
00:46:09,560 --> 00:46:13,239
Speaker 1: because you've watched Apollo thirteen. He was the commander of

869
00:46:13,400 --> 00:46:17,840
Speaker 1: the Apollo thirteen space mission. He also in nineteen fifty

870
00:46:17,920 --> 00:46:22,040
Speaker 1: four was flying a mission in a McDonald F two

871
00:46:22,239 --> 00:46:27,920
Speaker 1: H Banshee night fighter and sound jet. Yeah, yeah, cool jet.

872
00:46:27,960 --> 00:46:30,400
Speaker 1: But he had an issue in that um There was

873
00:46:30,400 --> 00:46:34,320
Speaker 1: an electrical failure on his plane and all his instruments

874
00:46:34,360 --> 00:46:38,239
Speaker 1: went dead. And it's at night and he has to

875
00:46:38,280 --> 00:46:41,960
Speaker 1: find the aircraft carrier by vision, like you have to

876
00:46:42,120 --> 00:46:44,880
Speaker 1: find it, like you know, he didn't have any electric

877
00:46:45,120 --> 00:46:48,480
Speaker 1: electronics to tell him where anything was because the electrical failure,

878
00:46:49,600 --> 00:46:52,560
Speaker 1: So he had to find the carrier the U. S. S.

879
00:46:52,560 --> 00:46:57,440
Speaker 1: Shangri law. And the way he found it was he

880
00:46:57,520 --> 00:47:04,080
Speaker 1: saw a luminous trail from luminescent algae that was left

881
00:47:04,120 --> 00:47:06,960
Speaker 1: in the wake of the carrier and followed it to

882
00:47:07,000 --> 00:47:10,799
Speaker 1: the carriers that he could land. Successful. And what that

883
00:47:10,840 --> 00:47:14,040
Speaker 1: guy hasn't lived through or he hadn't lived through, it's

884
00:47:14,080 --> 00:47:19,040
Speaker 1: pretty crazy. Yeah, So yeah, I think we've really driven

885
00:47:19,080 --> 00:47:22,480
Speaker 1: it home. But yeah, dangerous location, right, one of the

886
00:47:22,560 --> 00:47:25,840
Speaker 1: things that we haven't talked about yet. It's also on

887
00:47:26,000 --> 00:47:30,880
Speaker 1: the flight deck is the island. Yeah, yeah, this is important.

888
00:47:30,920 --> 00:47:34,840
Speaker 1: This is where the I guess all the radar capabilities

889
00:47:34,880 --> 00:47:39,239
Speaker 1: and the satellite yeah, the crew that the commanders are

890
00:47:39,280 --> 00:47:42,399
Speaker 1: walking around up there, um telling people what to do.

891
00:47:42,520 --> 00:47:44,840
Speaker 1: So this is this is like the tower structure that

892
00:47:44,880 --> 00:47:49,080
Speaker 1: you would see on the top of an aircraft carrier. Um.

893
00:47:49,120 --> 00:47:53,279
Speaker 1: It's the command center and it's the command center for

894
00:47:53,280 --> 00:47:56,359
Speaker 1: the flight deck as well as the general ship right,

895
00:47:56,880 --> 00:47:59,880
Speaker 1: and it has uh, lots of different decks to it

896
00:48:00,280 --> 00:48:02,960
Speaker 1: as well. It is about a hundred fifty ft tall

897
00:48:03,040 --> 00:48:06,760
Speaker 1: that's about forty six but only about twenty ft wide

898
00:48:07,200 --> 00:48:10,520
Speaker 1: or six ms wide at the base of the island.

899
00:48:11,239 --> 00:48:13,319
Speaker 1: That's also because you don't want to take up too

900
00:48:13,400 --> 00:48:15,000
Speaker 1: much space on the flight deck. You want to have

901
00:48:15,040 --> 00:48:18,080
Speaker 1: as much of that space available as possible. Uh. And

902
00:48:18,280 --> 00:48:21,480
Speaker 1: this is where you have lots of different decks that

903
00:48:21,560 --> 00:48:24,239
Speaker 1: have important elements to it. So at the very top

904
00:48:24,280 --> 00:48:27,920
Speaker 1: you've got that array of satellite dishes, radar dishes, that

905
00:48:28,000 --> 00:48:31,320
Speaker 1: kind of stuff. Below that is the primary flight control

906
00:48:31,480 --> 00:48:36,440
Speaker 1: or price fly. The Navy has lots of fun names

907
00:48:36,440 --> 00:48:39,560
Speaker 1: for everything. Like you know, when we mentioned about the

908
00:48:39,680 --> 00:48:43,560
Speaker 1: arresting wires and landing in them. I watched a documentary

909
00:48:43,600 --> 00:48:45,560
Speaker 1: where the guy said, yeah, they call that landing in

910
00:48:45,600 --> 00:48:49,120
Speaker 1: the spaghetti when you're when you're landing in the cables,

911
00:48:49,360 --> 00:48:51,480
Speaker 1: landing in the spaghetti. Good term makes sense, right, I

912
00:48:51,480 --> 00:48:54,440
Speaker 1: mean really does. And it always makes me wonder if

913
00:48:54,440 --> 00:48:57,040
Speaker 1: he's just if they're just yanking our chains at that point,

914
00:48:57,080 --> 00:49:00,680
Speaker 1: like what can we tell them? And they're watch they're

915
00:49:00,680 --> 00:49:04,480
Speaker 1: gonna start using that. Yeah, I kind of call land

916
00:49:04,480 --> 00:49:07,799
Speaker 1: against alright, So the price fly if that's what they

917
00:49:07,840 --> 00:49:10,600
Speaker 1: call it. Um is the bridge, and that's the ship's

918
00:49:10,600 --> 00:49:13,480
Speaker 1: command center. Yes, the bridge. Now this is where I

919
00:49:13,520 --> 00:49:18,040
Speaker 1: am in my familiar element because I love ships. I

920
00:49:18,080 --> 00:49:21,359
Speaker 1: love ships, and the bridge is that command center where

921
00:49:21,400 --> 00:49:26,200
Speaker 1: the captain oversees the control of the ship. Uh. Now,

922
00:49:26,440 --> 00:49:29,880
Speaker 1: keep in mind that aircraft carriers typically are part of

923
00:49:30,040 --> 00:49:32,479
Speaker 1: a larger group of ships that they don't they aren't

924
00:49:32,480 --> 00:49:35,040
Speaker 1: traveling on their own. They have escort ships, so that

925
00:49:35,080 --> 00:49:39,560
Speaker 1: you have generally speaking, several in your group. Now, a

926
00:49:39,640 --> 00:49:45,040
Speaker 1: captain only commands one ship. That is, the captain's responsibility

927
00:49:45,080 --> 00:49:47,680
Speaker 1: is to that ship and that ship alone. So the

928
00:49:47,719 --> 00:49:52,239
Speaker 1: captain is on the bridge. Um, and can that's where

929
00:49:52,320 --> 00:49:55,520
Speaker 1: you have your your helmsman who is controlling the steering

930
00:49:55,640 --> 00:49:59,960
Speaker 1: of the the vehicle, the aircraft carrier. You have an

931
00:50:00,080 --> 00:50:03,600
Speaker 1: the one the lee helmsman who controls the since commands

932
00:50:03,600 --> 00:50:06,040
Speaker 1: down to engineering for the speed. So you know, Mr

933
00:50:06,040 --> 00:50:08,000
Speaker 1: Scott down and engineering can give it, give it or

934
00:50:08,040 --> 00:50:12,360
Speaker 1: more powder. Captain was the worst Scottish accent I've ever tried. Um.

935
00:50:12,520 --> 00:50:15,680
Speaker 1: You you have also the Quartermaster of the watch who

936
00:50:15,800 --> 00:50:21,080
Speaker 1: is keeping track of the navigation information. Uh and uh.

937
00:50:22,000 --> 00:50:26,080
Speaker 1: Below that you have a deck where you have the

938
00:50:26,080 --> 00:50:29,920
Speaker 1: flag bridge. That's where the admiral is now. The admiral

939
00:50:30,080 --> 00:50:33,760
Speaker 1: is in charge of all the vessels in that group,

940
00:50:34,040 --> 00:50:36,960
Speaker 1: not just the aircraft carrier. So the captain commands the

941
00:50:36,960 --> 00:50:40,560
Speaker 1: aircraft carrier. The admiral has the the job of of

942
00:50:40,640 --> 00:50:44,279
Speaker 1: administering for the entire group of shops. And then below

943
00:50:44,320 --> 00:50:47,560
Speaker 1: the flag bridge is just a various operational centers. I

944
00:50:47,560 --> 00:50:51,040
Speaker 1: mean these are these are where they monitor the deck

945
00:50:51,080 --> 00:50:53,400
Speaker 1: control and launch operations and stuff like that. I mean,

946
00:50:53,480 --> 00:50:55,439
Speaker 1: let's say it's a love again. Some of the names,

947
00:50:55,440 --> 00:50:59,200
Speaker 1: like the aircraft handling officers sometimes called the handler or mangler.

948
00:51:00,040 --> 00:51:02,000
Speaker 1: That's a big difference between the you can learn the

949
00:51:02,000 --> 00:51:05,440
Speaker 1: mangler if you ask me. My My favorite description in

950
00:51:05,680 --> 00:51:08,800
Speaker 1: this how Stuff Works article, which by the way, is fantastic.

951
00:51:08,960 --> 00:51:10,920
Speaker 1: I highly recommend if you're interested in this to go

952
00:51:11,000 --> 00:51:13,520
Speaker 1: to how Stuff Works and look up how aircraft carriers work.

953
00:51:14,000 --> 00:51:19,319
Speaker 1: My favorite description is how the aircraft handler. Their job

954
00:51:19,400 --> 00:51:21,919
Speaker 1: is to track which aircraft are on the flight deck,

955
00:51:21,960 --> 00:51:24,960
Speaker 1: which ones are in the hangar, which ones are out

956
00:51:25,320 --> 00:51:28,160
Speaker 1: you know, have flown off um and they do so

957
00:51:28,320 --> 00:51:31,319
Speaker 1: using something called the Luigi board. Oh yes, this is

958
00:51:31,360 --> 00:51:33,920
Speaker 1: like a cool toy. Yeah, yeah, this is really neat.

959
00:51:34,320 --> 00:51:38,560
Speaker 1: Yeah it's it's it's a transparent table that has outlines

960
00:51:38,680 --> 00:51:41,320
Speaker 1: of the flight deck and the hangar deck and little

961
00:51:41,360 --> 00:51:44,640
Speaker 1: cutouts that represent each aircraft. And they're to scale, so

962
00:51:44,840 --> 00:51:47,560
Speaker 1: the bigger aircraft have bigger cutouts than the small aircraft.

963
00:51:47,560 --> 00:51:48,960
Speaker 1: Well they have to, otherwise they wouldn't know how many

964
00:51:49,000 --> 00:51:51,440
Speaker 1: would fit and where they would exactly. It's all the scale,

965
00:51:51,440 --> 00:51:53,560
Speaker 1: so they know exactly how to place everything and exactly

966
00:51:53,560 --> 00:51:55,719
Speaker 1: where it fits out. So I like this. I like this. Uh,

967
00:51:56,000 --> 00:51:59,320
Speaker 1: I like it when things are are measured and and organized,

968
00:51:59,360 --> 00:52:02,480
Speaker 1: like I enjoyed it. Like this procedure. It looks like

969
00:52:02,600 --> 00:52:05,120
Speaker 1: it sounds to me like like it's it's it's the

970
00:52:05,200 --> 00:52:08,680
Speaker 1: super coolest version of risk. You know, you're moving, all right,

971
00:52:08,719 --> 00:52:11,120
Speaker 1: I need to move these aircraft from my hangar to

972
00:52:11,200 --> 00:52:14,240
Speaker 1: the flight deck, and then I move these little models

973
00:52:14,280 --> 00:52:16,080
Speaker 1: from this part of the etching to that part of

974
00:52:16,120 --> 00:52:18,520
Speaker 1: etching to represent that. And not only that, you look

975
00:52:18,520 --> 00:52:21,560
Speaker 1: at the window and it happens in real life. A

976
00:52:21,640 --> 00:52:24,360
Speaker 1: real plane on a real ship is the best again,

977
00:52:24,440 --> 00:52:27,120
Speaker 1: the best game of risk ever. Right. Uh. Then you

978
00:52:27,160 --> 00:52:30,560
Speaker 1: also have the combat direction center. Obviously that would be

979
00:52:30,640 --> 00:52:33,720
Speaker 1: very important whenever the ship is actively involved in combat.

980
00:52:33,960 --> 00:52:37,560
Speaker 1: You've got the galley deck that's immediately below the flight deck.

981
00:52:37,600 --> 00:52:40,160
Speaker 1: You've got the hangar deck, which is lower down that's

982
00:52:40,160 --> 00:52:43,640
Speaker 1: where all the aircraft arts. It's actually several decks tall.

983
00:52:43,760 --> 00:52:46,919
Speaker 1: It's called the hangar deck, but it's actually multiple decks

984
00:52:46,960 --> 00:52:49,680
Speaker 1: tall because you have to accommodate those aircraft. By the way,

985
00:52:49,960 --> 00:52:52,319
Speaker 1: do yourself a favor and get on Google images and

986
00:52:52,360 --> 00:52:55,880
Speaker 1: look at a hanger hangar deck at some point. It's amazing,

987
00:52:55,960 --> 00:52:58,040
Speaker 1: it really is. It's so cool the way they they

988
00:52:58,040 --> 00:53:00,080
Speaker 1: position all the planes. I mean, they're all put in

989
00:53:00,120 --> 00:53:02,520
Speaker 1: there exactly in precisely the right way. And this is

990
00:53:02,520 --> 00:53:05,040
Speaker 1: where they move them in and out on the elevators.

991
00:53:05,040 --> 00:53:06,480
Speaker 1: You have a lift systems to get them up to

992
00:53:06,520 --> 00:53:09,239
Speaker 1: the flight deck. It's really it's a neat space. It's

993
00:53:09,239 --> 00:53:12,520
Speaker 1: almost like um, it's like several warehouses is what it

994
00:53:12,520 --> 00:53:15,920
Speaker 1: looks like, linked together, and then they store this just

995
00:53:16,000 --> 00:53:18,839
Speaker 1: an incredible arsenal of planes in there. Some of these

996
00:53:18,880 --> 00:53:21,759
Speaker 1: can have like eighty or more aircraft aboard them. Yeah,

997
00:53:21,760 --> 00:53:23,360
Speaker 1: how do you how do you figure out how to

998
00:53:23,440 --> 00:53:26,920
Speaker 1: move around eighty aircraft without bumping into each other all

999
00:53:26,960 --> 00:53:30,520
Speaker 1: the time. And they even have uh door doors that

1000
00:53:30,600 --> 00:53:34,719
Speaker 1: can close between different chambers. Obviously that is a safety precaution.

1001
00:53:34,840 --> 00:53:38,520
Speaker 1: Let's say that the aircraft carrier has entered combat. You

1002
00:53:38,560 --> 00:53:42,560
Speaker 1: want to be able to shut debt, close off one version,

1003
00:53:42,680 --> 00:53:45,239
Speaker 1: one part of the hangar bay from the others. If

1004
00:53:45,600 --> 00:53:48,560
Speaker 1: there were an enemy attack that that pierced part of it,

1005
00:53:48,600 --> 00:53:51,920
Speaker 1: because you want to control the spread of fire. So

1006
00:53:52,360 --> 00:53:54,800
Speaker 1: you might be able to close one of those doors

1007
00:53:54,800 --> 00:53:58,279
Speaker 1: and save three quarters of your aircraft in the case

1008
00:53:58,320 --> 00:54:00,520
Speaker 1: of catastrophe, or you know, even if it were just

1009
00:54:00,840 --> 00:54:03,919
Speaker 1: an accident and not an act of combat, you would

1010
00:54:03,960 --> 00:54:05,920
Speaker 1: want that ability. And then at the back end of that,

1011
00:54:06,239 --> 00:54:09,239
Speaker 1: the of the hangar area is an open section at

1012
00:54:09,280 --> 00:54:10,799
Speaker 1: the at the very aft end of the ship, at

1013
00:54:10,800 --> 00:54:12,960
Speaker 1: the very back end, that they can open up a

1014
00:54:13,000 --> 00:54:16,160
Speaker 1: door and they can test jet engines off the back

1015
00:54:16,200 --> 00:54:18,800
Speaker 1: of the of the boat. Would that be only safe

1016
00:54:18,840 --> 00:54:22,000
Speaker 1: place to do it because it's open to the air. Yeah,

1017
00:54:22,000 --> 00:54:25,200
Speaker 1: that's uh, that's just aft of the aircraft inter uh

1018
00:54:25,400 --> 00:54:29,760
Speaker 1: intermediate Maintenance division or ai m D shops. That's where

1019
00:54:29,880 --> 00:54:32,960
Speaker 1: they would do the basic maintenance that would be needed

1020
00:54:32,960 --> 00:54:38,240
Speaker 1: to make sure the aircraft remain in you know, fliable condition. Uh. Yeah,

1021
00:54:38,719 --> 00:54:40,680
Speaker 1: And again all of this is necessary just for the

1022
00:54:40,719 --> 00:54:44,239
Speaker 1: basic function of the aircraft carrier as its purpose as

1023
00:54:44,280 --> 00:54:47,399
Speaker 1: a military vehicle. Then on top of that you have

1024
00:54:47,600 --> 00:54:52,640
Speaker 1: all the mess halls, the galleys, the sleeping arrangements, which

1025
00:54:52,719 --> 00:54:58,200
Speaker 1: are cozy at best. So Scott, Scott, Yeah, okay, you're

1026
00:54:58,200 --> 00:55:00,560
Speaker 1: still here. Good, I'm still here, all right? Good. Uh.

1027
00:55:00,880 --> 00:55:02,600
Speaker 1: It turns out we had a lot more to say

1028
00:55:02,600 --> 00:55:06,279
Speaker 1: about aircraft carriers than than what I might have originally anticipated,

1029
00:55:07,200 --> 00:55:11,840
Speaker 1: and therefore we have decided to split the epic episode

1030
00:55:11,920 --> 00:55:14,320
Speaker 1: into two slightly less epic episode. I think that's a

1031
00:55:14,360 --> 00:55:18,120
Speaker 1: good plan, yeah, because honestly, you can't you guys can't

1032
00:55:18,160 --> 00:55:21,319
Speaker 1: handle an hour and forty minute long podcast. No, no, no,

1033
00:55:21,360 --> 00:55:23,000
Speaker 1: I'm looking at my notes here. There's a there's a

1034
00:55:23,000 --> 00:55:24,640
Speaker 1: lot more to cover. I mean, we haven't even talked

1035
00:55:24,680 --> 00:55:27,279
Speaker 1: about the classes of ships. So let's get the Well,

1036
00:55:27,600 --> 00:55:31,480
Speaker 1: we'll make the second episode the classy episode, the class

1037
00:55:31,560 --> 00:55:34,520
Speaker 1: lest episode, and the next one is the classy episode. Guys,

1038
00:55:34,560 --> 00:55:36,640
Speaker 1: if you want to if you really want to experience

1039
00:55:36,719 --> 00:55:41,200
Speaker 1: class you need to go check out Car Stuff Classy podcast.

1040
00:55:41,320 --> 00:55:45,239
Speaker 1: Thank you, especially with your classic cars. Uh. You and

1041
00:55:45,400 --> 00:55:48,920
Speaker 1: Ben have covered some really cool topics in Car Stuff

1042
00:55:48,920 --> 00:55:51,600
Speaker 1: as You've got some amazing videos too, so you guys

1043
00:55:51,600 --> 00:55:53,719
Speaker 1: gotta check that out. If you've ever wanted to get

1044
00:55:53,760 --> 00:55:57,200
Speaker 1: an up close look at exotic cars, you guys do

1045
00:55:57,280 --> 00:56:00,399
Speaker 1: a good job of getting a getting right up, been there.

1046
00:56:00,760 --> 00:56:03,759
Speaker 1: Thank You're too kind. Yeah, so check that stuff out. Guys.

1047
00:56:03,760 --> 00:56:05,719
Speaker 1: If you have any suggestions for me, you have a

1048
00:56:05,800 --> 00:56:08,680
Speaker 1: request for a particular topic, send me a message at

1049
00:56:08,719 --> 00:56:11,120
Speaker 1: email addresses tech Stuff at how stuff works dot com,

1050
00:56:11,200 --> 00:56:13,720
Speaker 1: or drop me a line on Facebook, Twitter or Tumbler.

1051
00:56:13,800 --> 00:56:15,920
Speaker 1: The handle at all free is tech stuff hs W.

1052
00:56:16,719 --> 00:56:23,560
Speaker 1: We'll tell to you again really soon for more on

1053
00:56:23,640 --> 00:56:26,400
Speaker 1: this and thousands of other topics is how stock works.

1054
00:56:26,400 --> 00:56:36,200
Speaker 1: Dot com