Arresting gear

An arresting gear, or arrestor gear, is a mechanical system used to rapidly decelerate an aircraft as it lands. Arresting gear on aircraft carriers is an essential component of naval aviation, and it is most commonly used on CATOBAR and STOBAR aircraft carriers. Similar systems are also found at land-based airfields for expeditionary or emergency use. Typical systems consist of several steel wire ropes laid across the aircraft landing area, designed to be caught by an aircraft's tailhook. During a normal arrestment, the tailhook engages the wire and the aircraft's kinetic energy is transferred to hydraulic damping systems attached below the carrier deck. There are other related systems that use nets to catch aircraft wings or landing gear. These barricade and barrier systems are only used for emergency arrestments for aircraft without operable tailhooks. Arresting cable systems were invented by Hugh Robinson and were utilized by Eugene Ely on his first landing on a ship—the armored cruiser , on 18 January 1911. These early systems had cables run through pulleys and attached to dead weights, such as sandbags. More modern arresting cables were tested on in June 1931, designed by Commander C. C. Mitchell. Modern U.S. Navy aircraft carriers have the Mark 7 Mod 3 arresting gear installed, which have the capability of recovering a aircraft at an engaging speed of in a distance of in two seconds. The system is designed to absorb theoretical maximum energy of at maximum cable run-out. Prior to the introduction of the angled flight deck, two systems were used (in addition to deck cables) to keep landing aircraft from running into parked aircraft further forward on the flight deck: the barrier and the barricade. If the aircraft tailhook failed to catch a wire, its landing gear would be caught by a net known as the barrier. If the aircraft caught a wire upon touchdown, the barrier could be quickly lowered to allow aircraft to taxi over it. The final safety net was the barricade, a large, net that prevented landing aircraft from crashing into other aircraft parked on the bow.

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Flight deck

The flight deck of an aircraft carrier is the surface from which its aircraft take off and land, essentially a miniature airfield at sea. On smaller naval ships which do not have aviation as a primary mission, the landing area for helicopters and other VTOL aircraft is also referred to as the flight deck. The official U.S. Navy term for these vessels is "air-capable ships". Flight decks have been in use upon ships since 1910, the American pilot Eugene Ely being the first individual to take off from a warship.

Naval aviation

Naval aviation is the application of military air power by navies, whether from warships that embark aircraft, or land bases. Naval aviation units are typically projected to a position nearer the target by way of an aircraft carrier. Carrier-based aircraft must be sturdy enough to withstand demanding carrier operations. They must be able to launch in a short distance and be sturdy and flexible enough to come to a sudden stop on a pitching flight deck; they typically have robust folding mechanisms that allow higher numbers of them to be stored in below-decks hangars and small spaces on flight decks.

Aircraft catapult

An aircraft catapult is a device used to allow aircraft to take off in a limited distance, typically from the deck of a vessel. They can also be installed on land-based runways, although this is rarely done. They are usually used on aircraft carriers as a form of assisted take off. In the form used on aircraft carriers the catapult consists of a track, or slot, built into the flight deck, below which is a large piston or shuttle that is attached through the track to the nose gear of the aircraft, or in some cases a wire rope, called a catapult bridle, is attached to the aircraft and the catapult shuttle.

Influences of polymer concrete surfacing and localised load distribution on behaviour up to failure of an orthotropic FRP bridge deck

Thomas Keller, Wendel Michael Sebastian

This paper presents experimental results which demonstrate the important, but to date little-studied influence of surfacing on the response up to failure of orthotropic GFRP bridge decking local to concentrated loading. Four bonded deck specimens were test ...

Elsevier2013

Progress on modeling EM interaction with complex systems: applications to aircraft and automobiles

Michel Ianoz

Summary form only given. The EM topology method was developed at the end of the 1980s. Experimental validations performed during the last 2-3 years, have permitted to achieve a significant progress pertaining to the assessment of effects of electromagnetic ...

1999