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The training accident killed eight Marines and one sailor. The former Navy commanding officer of the amphibious transport dock USS Somerset, who was officially censured for a training accident in which eight Marines and one sailor died, will not command an aircraft carrier after all. Navy Capt. John William Kurtz was the Somerset’s captain when an amphibious assault vehicle, or AAV, sank while returning to the ship during a July 30, 2020 training exercise. It was the deadliest training accident involving an AAV in Marine Corps history..... But not long after news broke that Kurtz had been selected to command...

A United State Postal Service mail carrier was shot dead Friday just before 6 p.m. in Democrat-run Milwaukee. FOX News reported that the mail carrier was a 44-year-old man who had been with USPS for 18 years. The man was shot while on the job and died at the scene, according to FOX6.

India commissioned its first home-built aircraft carrier Friday as it seeks to counter regional rival China's much larger and growing fleet, and expand its own indigenous shipbuilding capabilities. The INS Vikrant, whose name is a Sanskrit word for “powerful" or "courageous," is India's second operational aircraft carrier, joining the Soviet-era INS Vikramaditya that it purchased from Russia in 2004 to defend the Indian Ocean and Bay of Bengal. The new 262-meter (860-foot) carrier, designed by the Indian navy and built at the Cochin shipyard in southern India, was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi as part of the country's commemoration...

Investigators fear a £100million F-35 fighter jet crashed into the Mediterranean while taking off because the cheap rain covers had not been taken off properly. Officials believe the rain cover was sucked into the F-35B Lightning II stealth plane's engine as it took off from the flight deck of the HMS Queen Elizabeth, forcing the pilot to eject. Naval personnel reported seeing the cover floating in the sea nearby Britain's flagship aircraft carrier after the accident in the Mediterranean on Sunday. Sources said the RAF pilot realised the issue and tried to abort take-off but was unable to stop the...

The USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78), on the left, and the Nimitz class carrier USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75) transit the Atlantic Ocean in June 2020.After multiple issues and delays, the USS Gerald R. Ford is now set to go to sea for its maiden deployment in 2022 The much-delayed maiden deployment for the U.S. Navy’s new aircraft carrier, USS Gerald R. Ford is now scheduled to take place next year, four years later than originally planned. The nuclear-powered vessel is the lead ship in a new class of supercarriers, four of which have been ordered, with the three...

ABOARD THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER USS DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER – The busiest aircraft carrier on the East Coast is back home after two grueling, back-to-back deployments that kept the ship on station in the Middle East for a total of seven and a half months. Since USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69) left for its first deployment on Feb. 20, 2020, the ship has been deployed for 320 of the last 514 days – not counting training exercises and restriction of movement periods that have kept sailors away from family and loved ones. On Sunday, Ike slipped up the James River with...

UK media on Friday revealed another major military close encounter with a Russian vessel following the June 23 Black Sea warning shot incident – but this time in the Mediterranean where a Russian submarine was said to be “stalking” the Royal Navy’s Carrier Strike Group in the waters. The Telegraph on Friday broke the following based on defense sources: A Russian submarine stalked the Royal Navy’s Carrier Strike Group (CSG) prompting a helicopter hunt for the vessel, The Telegraph can reveal. Merlin helicopters were scrambled to search for the Russian submarine when the group was passing through the eastern Mediterranean.HMS...

TAIPEI—A U.S. aircraft carrier group led by the USS Ronald Reagan has entered the South China Sea as part of a routine mission, the U.S. Navy said on Tuesday, at a time of rising tensions between Washington and Beijing, which claims most the disputed waterway. China frequently objects to U.S. military missions in the South China Sea, and the announcement follows China blasting the Group of Seven nations for a statement scolding Beijing over a range of issues. “While in the South China Sea, the strike group is conducting maritime security operations, which include flight operations with fixed and rotary-wing...

A fleet of Chinese warplanes likely simulated an attack on a U.S. aircraft carrier group when a record 25 fighter jets and nuclear-capable bombers triggered Taiwan's air defense radars this week, analysts said on Tuesday. The military operation coincided with the Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group's (CSG) presence north of the Philippines, and came in the hours after Secretary of State Antony Blinken reaffirmed Washington's "serious commitment" to Taiwan and its self-defense. Beijing's use of its People's Liberation Army to intimidate democratic Taiwan became a matter of public record last September when the island's defense ministry began logging aircraft intrusions...

There are stronger signs that China’s next aircraft carrier will be fitted with an advanced type of aircraft launch system, with official confirmation of a test flight of a carrier-based early warning plane. State broadcaster CCTV confirmed in a report on the weekend that the KJ-600, the country’s first domestically developed fixed-wing early warning aircraft, had a test flight in Xian, Shaanxi province, in late January. The KJ-600 is designed to operate from an aircraft carrier but its weight and turboprop engines make it less powerful than a jet, requiring help from a catapult for take-off. China has two aircraft...

The U.S. on Wednesday announced it blacklisted Chinese officials and business executives involved in the military buildup of the disputed South China Sea, further ratcheting up tensions in the region ahead of the November election -- the same day that Beijing reportedly fired missiles including an "aircraft-carrier killer" into the sea as a "warning" to the U.S. China had claimed a U-2 spy plane entered a no-fly zone without permission during a naval drill in the Bohai Sea, a military source told the South China Morning Post. The Pentagon has given few details, but said a U-2 flew "within the...

Seoul, South Korea (CNN)South Korea plans to start building its first aircraft carrier next year, and acquire fighter jets to operate on it, the country's Defense Ministry has announced. Last year, South Korea hinted at its interest in an aircraft carrier, saying it would build a "multi-purpose large transport vessel." But in its national plan for 2021-2025, published this week, the government for the first time explicitly committed to building the billion-dollar equipment. "The 30,000-ton level aircraft carrier can transport military forces, equipment and materials and can operate fighter jets that are capable of vertical take-off and landing," said...

The US Navy mocked Iran for being 'experts' at building a target ship in an Instagram post that showed a bogus American aircraft carrier with a bullseye on it. The Navy proclaimed in a meme, 'IRAN BUILDS TARGET SHIP', revealing an overhead view of the fake vessel sitting at a port, unprotected and vulnerable with a bullseye, and adds across the bottom of the image, 'THEY'RE EXPERTS AT THAT'. The post comes after Iran built the replica of a Nimitz-class carrier and had its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard fire a missile at it in the strategic Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday...

BEIJING: China's Defense Ministry said the navy's only entirely home-built aircraft is carrying out sea trials to test weapons and equipment and enhance training of the crew. Ministry spokesperson Ren Guoqiang said Friday the exercises were being conducted as planned, apparently unaffected by the country's coronavirus outbreak.

Black smoke has been seen billowing from China’s first assault carrier in Shanghai. The new Type-075 carrier, which is similar to the U.S. Navy’s America Class assault carriers, is designed to carry helicopters and hovercraft to support amphibious landings. The smoke was reported on Chinese social media platforms earlier today. Images suggest that the fire took hold within the hull of the ship, possibly in the expansive aircraft hanger. Smoke came out of the open aircraft lift near the front of the island superstructure. Smoke also came out of the rear hangar opening. For a time a massive cloud of...

Note: This story has been updated with comments from the U.S. Navy. The captain of a nuclear aircraft carrier with more than 100 sailors infected with the coronavirus pleaded Monday with U.S. Navy officials for resources to allow isolation of his entire crew and avoid possible deaths in a situation he described as quickly deteriorating. The unusual plea from Capt. Brett Crozier, a Santa Rosa native, came in a letter obtained exclusively by The Chronicle and confirmed by a senior officer on board the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt, which has been docked in Guam following a COVID-19 outbreak among the...

**SNIP** On Monday, Biden held his first livestream using professional production equipment. Higher-quality lighting and equipment made Biden appear and sound better than when he appeared in a livestream last week following primary victories. Gone were Biden’s shiny forehead and the two American flags in front of a black curtain, traded in for lighting that gave color to Biden’s face and a library backdrop that some speculated was a digital green screen image. But there were still some kinks in the flow of his address. “Mics are hot,” a staff member said at the start of the stream. “Ready to...

On Martin Luther King Jr. Day at Pearl Harbor Monday, the U.S. Navy is expected to announce that a new aircraft carrier will be named after Mess Attendant 2nd Class Doris Miller, the first African American to receive the Navy Cross for valor for his actions on Dec. 7, 1941, when he manned a machine gun on the USS West Virginia to fire back at attacking Japanese planes. “I think that Doris Miller is an American hero simply because of what he represents as a young man going beyond the call of what’s expected,” said Doreen Ravenscroft, president of Cultural...

Russia’s only aircraft carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov, is on fire and might well never sail again. The trouble-stricken ship, which has seen fires, plane crashes, and narrowly escaped the loss of its drydock, is in flames. The fire reportedly covers the majority of the ship, and at this point it seems distinctly possible Russia’s largest ship will never sail again. The incident took place this morning, while the big ship was dockside at the 35th Ship Repair Plant in Murmansk. According to Russian state media, the fire broke out during “repair works in the first power unit” by workers of...