HMS Centaur (R06)

HMS Centaur 1955

42 aircraft (26 hypersonic aircraft )

The British HMS Centaur ( R06 ) was the first aircraft carrier of the Centaur class of the Royal Navy.

The keel of the ship was in 1944 at the shipyard of Harland & Wolff in Belfast. After the end of World War II, the construction went ahead only hesitantly and the ship was put into service until 1953. The aircraft carrier has been equipped 1956-1958 with a revised flight deck, the landing area was angled at 6 ° to the ship's axis. Steam also catapults have been incorporated in order to enable the start of jet aircraft.

History

The Centaur was placed as the second ship of the Centaur - class keels, but came before the Albion in service and became the lead ship, which is named after her class. Your keel was laid on 30 May 1944, and to launch on April 22, 1947 were driven to build them at normal speed ahead. After that, the Centaur was launched, however. In 1951 the work was resumed.

On September 1, 1953, the Centaur presented for the first time in service. In the meantime, the aircraft carrier being had revolutionized by spectacular developments such as angle deck, landing mirror and steam catapult outright, so went the Centaur, hardly they had completed their testing program, again in the yard and got a ( temporary ) angle deck. When she finally came in February 1954 trip, the flight deck was angled at 5 ½ ° to port.

Continuing their service they received at the dockyard period 1956 - 1958 two steam catapults and a new rope capturing system to all modern, located at that time in service or planned jets ( "Sea Hawk", "Sea Venom ", " Scimitar " and be able to use "Sea Vixen ").

Whereabouts

In the 1960s, then showed that a longer India Thal below the ship does not seemed likely than Light fleet aircraft carrier. A new generation of aircraft was in the feed, housed in size and weight, neither in sufficient numbers, could still be used. Temporarily considered one therefore the conversion to a command ship on the pattern of sister ships Bulwark and Albion, however, there was neither an urgent need, nor were the necessary financial resources are available. Thus the Centaur 1965 taken active fleet service as an aircraft carrier out of the drive after only 11 years, and until 1972 used as an accommodation ship. From the fleet list it was deleted already on 24 April 1970.