France's aircraft carrier was finished, handed over to the navy — and then sent back to have its flight deck made longer.
Fourteen feet too short
Charles de Gaulle was laid down in Brest in 1989 under a different name, Richelieu, and took more than a decade to build. Work stopped four times as defense budgets were cut. The ship had been designed around the jets France expected to fly from it, but in 1992, long after the design was fixed, the navy added a new requirement: it should operate the American E-2C Hawkeye, a large radar aircraft with a wide wingspan.
Sea trials showed the consequence. The angled landing deck was too short for a Hawkeye to land and clear it safely. Between October 1999 and March 2000, the finished carrier went back into the yard and its flight deck was lengthened by 4.4 meters — about fourteen feet.
A propeller in the Atlantic
The ship was handed over in September 2000. Two months later, crossing the western Atlantic at high speed on a trial voyage toward Norfolk, Virginia, it lost a large part of its port propeller and had to turn back to Toulon.
The quickest replacement available was a set of propellers from the retired carrier Clemenceau, which cut the top speed from 27 knots to about 24. New propellers followed, then further repairs, and it was 2001 before the ship finally entered service. By the end of that year its aircraft were flying missions over Afghanistan.
None of that has kept it from becoming the flagship of the French Navy for a quarter of a century. It is still the only nuclear-powered aircraft carrier ever built in Europe.
The model
COBI's Aircraft Carrier Charles de Gaulle, set 4868, is a 1:300 model built from 4,272 blocks. The flight deck lifts off to show the hangar, the aircraft elevators work, and miniature combat aircraft and an early-warning aircraft fill the deck. A display base and a printed nameplate are included.
It is available to pre-order. The expected shipping month is shown on the product page, and you can cancel any time before it ships.
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