USS Gerald Ford Has Bigger Weapon Capacity, Green Waste Removal System

The USS Gerald Ford is the most technologically advanced aircraft carrier the Navy has ever seen, with the ability to load weapons and launch aircraft faster that ever before while also containing cutting edge advancements like a green system of waste removal.

The carrier was christened at a ceremony in Newport News, Virginia, where shipbuilders have been assembling the massive watercraft for the past few years.

CNET correspondent Daniel Terdiman, who visited the Newport News shipyard in 2010 to see the early stages of the USS Gerald Ford, said it is a new class of carriers infused with technology.

Two of the most important advancements are the ship’s Advanced Jet Blast defectors and the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System. Combined the two systems will more efficiently launch aircraft, officials said.

While its designed to be a superior fighting instrument, the USS Gerald Ford is also a marvel of sustainability.

“The ship also features a series of green technologies, such as the so-called Plasma Arc Waste Disposal System, which is meant to cut on-board waste; an all-new propulsion plant; an improved structural design; and more,” Terdiman wrote.

The USS Gerald Ford is a giant ship, measuring 1,080 feet long and 100 feet high. It has a flight dock that’s 250 feet wide, and in all the ship has 47,000 tons of steel.

The ship will also produce 400,000 gallons of fresh water ever day, and the kitchen will make 15,000 meals a day.

“Although it is a very expensive ship, its a tremendous investment of the national treasury, in terms of resources. But the men and woman who sail here… that the true war fighting capability,” said Captain John Meier.

Before it can be launched, the USS Gerald Ford has to go through a series of tests. It will be the first new aircraft carrier class since the USS Nimitz was unveiled in 1968, and the first new carrier of any kind since the USS George H.W. Bush in 2003.