Navy Reviews Carrier Island Placement and Catapult System After President’s Design Directives

The U.S. Navy has launched an internal review to assess moving the flight-deck command tower—known as the “island”—toward the center of its new Ford-class aircraft carriers. The review, expected to produce recommendations within several weeks, follows President Donald Trump’s expressed desire for a more traditional carrier silhouette.

The Hill

The Ford-class carriers, including the under-construction USS Doris Miller, feature a starboard-side island positioned to maximize aircraft sortie generation. Trump’s national-security memo, issued on a recent Thursday, directed the Navy to replace the electromagnetic aircraft launch system (EMALS) with legacy steam catapults and to consider redesigning the island for aesthetic reasons. The memo does not reference the internal review, but the timing suggests a direct link between the president’s aesthetic preferences and the Navy’s design reassessment.

The Hill

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates each Ford-class carrier will cost roughly $22 billion to build. Redesigning the island and reverting to steam catapults would add “billions of dollars” in additional expenses, according to unnamed officials familiar with the engineering implications. The Navy currently operates 11 Nimitz-class carriers and is constructing three Ford-class hulls, with Huntington Ingalls Industries handling the USS Enterprise at Newport News Shipbuilding.

The Hill

Former maritime strategist Hunter Stires, who advised the Navy secretary until last year, warned that redesigning the nation’s premier capital ship to satisfy aesthetic whims would be “wasteful and abusive” and reflects “contempt for America’s fighting sailors.” Rear Adm. Paul Lanzilotta, former captain of the USS Gerald R. Ford, noted that the current island placement provides extra deck space for aircraft to line up, improving launch efficiency compared with older ships where aircraft must pause for recovery.

The Hill

Shifting the island’s location and reinstating steam catapults could reduce the carriers’ sortie generation rate and increase launch-cycle time, according to the officials cited. While the review is still preliminary, any design changes would affect the Navy’s future combat capability and the projected lifecycle cost of the Ford-class fleet.

The Hill