Design
The Wasp class is based on the preceding Tarawa-class design. The design was modified to allow for the operation of AV-8B Harrier II aircraft and Landing Craft Air Cushion (LCAC) hovercraft, making the Wasp class the first ships specifically designed to operate these. The main physical changes between the two designs are the lower placement of the ship's bridge aboard the Wasps, the relocation of the command and control facilities to inside the hull, the removal of the 5-inch Mk 45 naval guns and their sponsons on the forward edge of the flight deck, and a lengthening of 24 feet (7.3 m) to carry the LCACs.
Each Wasp class ship has a displacement of 41,150 metric tons (40,500 long tons; 45,360 short tons) at full load, is 253.2 metres (831 ft) long, has a beam of 31.8 metres (104 ft), and a draft of 8.1 metres (27 ft). For propulsion, most of the ships are fitted with two steam boilers connected to geared turbines, which deliver 70,000 shaft horsepower (33,849 kW) to the two propeller shafts. This allows the LHDs to reach speeds of 22 knots (41 km/h; 25 mph), with a range of 9,500 nautical miles (17,600 km; 10,900 mi) at 18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph). The last ship of the class, USS Makin Island, was instead fitted with two General Electric LM2500 geared gas turbines. The ship's company consists of 1,208 personnel. The ships are the largest amphibious warfare vessels in the world.
Read more about this topic: Wasp-class Amphibious Assault Ship
Famous quotes containing the word design:
“The reason American cars don’t sell anymore is that they have forgotten how to design the American Dream. What does it matter if you buy a car today or six months from now, because cars are not beautiful. That’s why the American auto industry is in trouble: no design, no desire.”
—Karl Lagerfeld (b. 1938)
“Humility is often only the putting on of a submissiveness by which men hope to bring other people to submit to them; it is a more calculated sort of pride, which debases itself with a design of being exalted; and though this vice transform itself into a thousand several shapes, yet the disguise is never more effectual nor more capable of deceiving the world than when concealed under a form of humility.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)
“Delay always breeds danger; and to protract a great design is often to ruin it.”
—Miguel De Cervantes (1547–1616)