Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!att!cbnews!cbnews!military
From: tighe@hydra.convex.com (Mike Tighe)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: More on angled flight decks
Message-ID: <1991Jan12.010728.22722@cbnews.att.com>
Date: 12 Jan 91 01:07:28 GMT
Sender: military@cbnews.att.com (William B. Thacker)
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Lines: 31
Approved: military@att.att.com



From: tighe@hydra.convex.com (Mike Tighe)
From: ron@hpfcso.fc.hp.com (Ron Miller)
 
> I'm amazed to see how many variations there are on "why do carriers have
> angled decks" in this forum. Some are correct, and some are focusing on
> secondary benefits.
 
> The simple answer is to allow a "touch-and-go" if the hook doesn't catch
> the wire instead of a "touch-and-crash-into-the-barrier-or-other-airplanes"
> of the old straight deck designs.
 
> If he'd been landing on a straight deck ship, I might have been a
> fatherless child upon the first pass :-(
 
What an angled flight deck can do, that a straight one cannot (safely), is
allow for the simultaneous launching and recovering of aircraft.
 
>From your message, it appears you do not think that a "touch-and-go" was
possible before the angled flight deck. It was. I doubt you would have been
"fatherless" if your father had been required to land on a straight flight
deck, since your father's landing attempt[s] would not be attempted until
the forward deck was clear. However, this would prevent the launching of
aircraft, and by angling the flight deck, this problem was solved.
 
Mike
 
PS: During Carrier Quals, F-14 did perform full-length "touch-and-go" on
    angled flight decks.