ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO, THE U.S. Navy commissioned one of the most unusual-and controversial-ships ever to enter the fleet. The USS Jupiter, a veteran coal transport, emerged from the shipyards at Portsmouth, Virginia, and was transformed into the new USS Langley, the Navy's first true aircraft carrier.
Today, the carrier is still the centerpiece of the battle fleet, and the service's carriers still have the same mission: to project air power from the sea. And while bigger and more capable than ever, carriers are also more expensive and vulnerable than ever.
New threats from Russia and China could spell the end of carriers, or force them to innovate into a new craft that will continue to dominate the maritime domain.
TODAY'S CARRIERS
The U.S. Navy operates a fleet of 11 aircraft carriers, 10 Nimitz-class carriers, and a new Ford-class carrier. All are nuclear powered and typically embark a carrier air wing of dozens of aircraft, including the likes of F/A/-18E/F Super Hornets, F-35C Joint Strike Fighters, and Seahawk helicopters.
Ten are based in the United States, split between the coasts. One carrier, the USS Ronald Reagan, is homeported at Yokosuka, Japan. At least three carriers are at sea at all times, with another three returning from a deployment or preparing for one. The remaining carriers are typically undergoing lengthy overhaul and modernization processes that leave them undeployable for two to four years.
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ONE OF THE 'GREATEST THREATS' TO THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST ISN'T WHAT YOU THINK.
EXPERTS ARE PREPARING THE REGION AGAINST THE THREAT OF DANGEROUS VOLCANIC MUDFLOWS, KNOWN AS LAHARS, WHICH COULD INUNDATE THE COMMUNITIES SURROUNDING MT. RAINIER IN AS LITTLE AS 30 MINUTES.
THE WORLD'S TOUGHEST ROW
They rowed 3,000 miles across the Atlantic, battling unpredictable weather, chaotic seas, and finicky equipment. But what they discovered gave them profound new insights into the power of the ocean.
HOW TO DIY OFF-GRID SOLAR
SPEND THE TIME UP FRONT AND PLAN IT CAREFULLY TO AVOID DISAPPOINTMENT
Are We on the Verge of an ARMS RACE in SPACE?
RUMORS OF A RUSSIAN SPACE NUKE, ALONG WITH OTHER SATELLITE-TARGETING WEAPONS, HAVE MADE GEOPOLITICAL TENSIONS EXTEND INTO ORBIT.
Fresh Fingerprints on an Ancient Statue
A CLAY FIGURINE HAS SPENT MILLENNIA incomplete, waiting at the bottom of a lake for its long-dead craftsman to finish the Iron Age-era statuette.
Quantum Entanglement in Our Brains
IT HAS LONG BEEN ARGUED THAT THE human brain is similar to a computer. But in reality, that's selling the brain pretty short.
The Tools of Copernicus
WAY BACK IN 1508, WITH ONLY LIMited tools at his disposal, Nicolaus Copernicus developed a celestial model of a heliocentric planetary system, which he described in hist landmark work De revolutionibus orbium coelestium. It was a complete overhaul of our conception of the universe-one that, unfortunately, earned him the ire of the Catholic church for decades after his death-and forever changed the way we look at the stars.
Building a Sixth-Generation Bomber Raptor
THE GLOBAL COMBAT AIR Programme (GCAP)-a project by the U.K., Italy, and Japan to develop a sixth-generation stealth fighter-has been busy at the drawing board reshaping its vision of the future of air warfare. And judging by the new concept model unveiled at this year's Farnborough air show, that future has big triangular wings.
The Electroweak Force of the Early Universe
TODAY, THE UNIVERSE AS WE KNOW IT IS governed by four fundamental forces: the strong nuclear force, the weak nuclear force, electromagnetism, and gravity.
This Ancient Fossil With a Brain and Guts
WE KNOW WHAT FOSSILS LOOK like. For example, typical dinosaur fossils are bones turned to stone and preserved from the passage of time, located, if we're particularly lucky, in large collections that can be reassembled to represent the beast they used to prop up in their entirety.
