A Disruptive Capability

Putting the LHD and the F-35B together, an engineer’s view

There’s a lot of attention being given to the possibility of putting the F-35B variant of the Lightning II on board the RAN’s new Canberra class LHDs. There’s also a lot of discussion, but also some disinformation.

Putting jet aircraft on ships is a fairly arcane art. There aren’t many countries that do it, and there’s not much international cooperation. So, when politicians pose questions like ‘Can we put these new stealth aircraft on our big new ships?’ a lot of opinions are bound to emerge. However, not many of them are informed. So, let’s look at the key challenges that will decide whetherF-35Bs could work off the LHDs, and along the way set out some useful information.