LONDON–The United Kingdom’s newest class of aircraft carrier, the HMS Queen Elizabeth, will host United States F-35s starting in 2021, U.K. Defense Secretary Michael Fallon said Wednesday.
The Queen Elizabeth-class carriers will be the biggest and most powerful warships ever constructed for Royal Navy, according to the U.K. Ministry of Defence. The other Queen Elizabeth-class carrier will be the HMS Prince of Wales, which had its final structural section lowered into place earlier this summer, according to the Royal Navy. The HMS Queen Elizabeth will have a range of 10,000 nautical miles at 500 nautical miles per day with 65,000-ton displacement. It will also be 280 meters long and 90 meters wide.
Fallon, in a press conference with Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, said he also expects U.K. F-35s to be hosted on U.S. aircraft carriers. Carter didn’t say whether the U.S. would host British F-35s. The F-35 Joint Program Office (JPO) was unable return a request for comment by press time Wednesday.
The HMS Queen Elizabeth is slated to begin sea trials next year and to be handed over to the MoD on behalf of the Royal Navy and the U.K. Armed forces, according to the Aircraft Carrier Alliance, the team of BAE Systems, Thales, Babcock and the MoD that are building the carriers. The HMS Prince of Wales is set to begin sea trials in 2017.
Each of the Queen Elizabeth-class carriers can take up to 40 aircraft, both rotary and fixed wing. It is predicted they will routinely operate with 12 F-35s while being capable of carrying up to 36 F-35B short takeoff and vertical landing (STOVL) variants. The Queen Elizabeth-class carriers are also designed to receive the latest generation of Raytheon‘s [RTN] Phalanx close-in weapon system. The carriers are also designed to receive 30mm guns and mini-guns to counter asymmetric threats.