SEVEROMORSK. March 23 (Interfax-AVN) - The Admiral Kuznetsov heavy aircraft carrier has put out to the Barents Sea to get ready for an exercise scheduled for next month, the Northern Fleet press service said on Wednesday.
The ship left the roads of Severomorsk at about 11:00 a.m. Moscow time (0800 GMT) and headed for a naval proving range, a press service official told Interfax.
Course missions will be practiced in the framework of preparations for the exercise, while deck fighters will practice takeoff from and landing on the ship's deck and flights to the shore and back.
The preparations involve a total of 10 planes who will take off from the Severomorsk-3 base camp, land on the deck, take off and then land on the airfield again.
The Admiral Kuznetsov of Project 11435 (headed by Colonel Alexander Shevchenko) entered service with the Navy in 1993. It is the only ship in the Russian Navy capable of using deck aviation. The aircraft carrier is capable of carrying up to 52 aircraft, including SU-33 Flanker planes and KA-27 Helix helicopters. It is armed with the Granit anti-ship missile system, the Kashtan missile system, and the Klinok air defense system.
The power plant, comprising two 50,000 hp engines, allows the ship to reach a speed of up to 32 knots.
The aircraft carrier has a length of 302.3 m, a width of 72.3 m, an immersion of 9.14 m, a standard displacement of 43,000 tonnes, an endurance of 45 days, a crew of 1,960 men, and an air wing of 626 people.
The cruiser will take part in the command post exercise in mid-April. The event will be supervised by Navy Commander-in-Chief Vladimir Kuroyedov.
The exercise will have a planned nature and sum up results of the winter instruction period. It will traditionally have two stages - a theoretical and a practical ones.
In particular, at the theoretical stage officers of C2 bodies will demonstrate their knowledge of regulatory documents and hold exercises on maps. In general, officers serving at military bodies ranging from division headquarters to fleet headquarters will take a theory exam. At the practical, or naval, stage, ships of the fleet will practice joint sailing and maneuvering, as well as perform live firing.