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China is Building the World's Largest Amphib and Adding a Catapult

Type 076
Via Chinese social media

Published Aug 1, 2024 11:23 PM by The Maritime Executive

CSSC Hudong Zhonghua, a prolific builder of boxships and LNG carriers for the global market, is constructing the world's largest amphibious assault vessel for the People's Liberation Army Navy - and unlike any other amphib, it has a catapult.

New satellite photos obtained by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) show that Hudong Zhonghua's brand new expansion yard on Changxing Island is constructing a big-deck amphibious assault ship, and at a phenomenal pace. Hudong Zhonghua is the builder of the preceding Type 075 class, and the new design is much bigger.

The rectangular flight deck measures about 850 feet long by 170 feet wide, making it about an acre larger than the U.S. Navy's America-class amphib. It appears to have dual elevators, port and starboard, for handling a higher volume of aircraft traffic than the previous-generation Type 075. Like a conventional amphib, it has a well deck at the stern for launch and recovery of landing craft.

The new vessel also appears to have a trench in the flight deck for the installation of a catapult. No other amphibious assault ship has ever had the capability to launch fixed-wing aircraft by catapult, and the technology would allow the Type 076 to handle much larger and heavier aircraft than its peers, according to CSIS. The system is widely believed to be an electromagnetic catapult, like the system aboard USS Gerald R. Ford, as this is the technology that China has pursued in R&D. It would be a meaningful advantage: short-takeoff/vertical-takeoff flight operations on a flat-top amphib require specialized aircraft and lighter payloads, and a catapult opens up possibilities for longer range - or something else. 

Open-source analysts have long predicted a possible role for China's GJ-11 unmanned attack aircraft aboard the Type 076. The new satellite imaging of Hudong Zhonghua appears to bear out those forecasts: at a storage site in a corner of the shipyard, in clear view of satellite surveillance, two mockups of the GJ-11 unmanned fighter jet sit in an enclosed paddock. (It is a standard practice to use mockups to test out deck handling on a new carrier design before bringing aboard real aircraft.) China claims that the experimental aircraft has weapons capabilities for air combat and suppression of air defenses. 

Apart from the Type 076's size and advanced technology, the sheer speed of construction of the new vessel is remarkable. The drydock itself was just finished in September 2023, and the warship's hull is already nearing completion, along with the hulls of three new frigates - all assembled in 11 months in one graving dock. At this pace, according to CSIS, the Type 076 could be launched as early as next year.