German aircraft carrier I (1915)
The Ausonia was an unfinished Italian passenger ship, named after a landscape in southern Italy, which was to be rebuilt at the end of the First World War by the Imperial Navy of the German Empire to the aircraft carrier.
Prehistory
The Imperial Navy had it rebuilt several former merchant ships to aircraft mother ships and equipped with two to four seaplanes, which were then used for educational purposes. After the light cruiser Stuttgart had been converted to the aircraft cruiser (with three seaplanes ) and one was happy with the result, even the obsolete Great cruiser Roon (with four seaplanes ) was first planned to rebuild and the light cruisers Stettin accordingly. These plans were abandoned in October 1918 after he was, instead, decided in the design office of the Imperial Naval Office for the 1914 at Blohm & Voss in Hamburg to Kiel down, spilled from the stack on 15 April 1915, and since then there unfinished lying Italian turbine passenger liner Ausonia convert to an aircraft carrier and then ask as " aircraft steamer I" in service.
Planning design
The Ausonia was 158.8 m ( 149.6 m in the water line ) and 18.8 m wide. She had 7,43 m Draft and should be 12,585 tons in size. The machinery consisted of two Blohm & Voss steam turbines with a total power of 18,000 hp, which allowed a top speed of 21 knots.
The draft plan of the Imperial Naval Office foresaw a kind of hybrid between the aircraft carrier and aircraft carriers. The ship was carrying up to 19 seaplanes and 10 Radflugzeuge. Like other carriers of the time it should have a long landing deck on the aft deck and a shorter start on the forecastle, were able to launch from the aircraft directly from the hangar of the. In contrast to the already operating British carriers ( such as HMS Furious and HMS Argus) should have the ship island structures as on all aircraft carriers became common later.
Whereabouts
These plans were rendered obsolete by the end of the war in November 1918, and the hull of the ship was canceled in 1922 in the shipyard.