{"id":812853,"date":"2026-08-14T01:20:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-14T01:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/812853\/"},"modified":"2026-08-14T01:20:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-14T01:20:10","slug":"trump-orders-us-aircraft-carriers-to-go-back-to-steam-catapults","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/812853\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump orders US aircraft carriers to go back to steam catapults"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">President Donald Trump ordered the US Navy to return to using steam catapults to launch planes off of aircraft carriers, acting on a long-time complaint despite opposition from many naval officers.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">In a presidential memorandum, Trump ordered US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth to come up with a plan within 60 days on what would be needed to use hydraulic catapults in the next Gerald Ford-class nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The planned USS Doris Miller will be the fourth ship in the six-vessel Gerald R. Ford class of aircraft carriers.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The Navy has struggled with problems surrounding its modern electromagnetic system to launch jets off the first of the new aircraft carriers, the USS Gerald R. Ford.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">That issue caught Trump\u2019s attention several years ago, and he has criticised it frequently since, including last month, when he recounted how a servicemember complained about the newer system.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"An F-14 Tomcat roars down a steam-driven catapult system on board the USS Nimitz in November 1998. Photo: AFP\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/97868159-0837-4540-81d0-8c8007d7abd9_461518e4.jpg\" title=\"An F-14 Tomcat roars down a steam-driven catapult system on board the USS Nimitz in November 1998. Photo: AFP\"\/>An F-14 Tomcat roars down a steam-driven catapult system on board the USS Nimitz in November 1998. Photo: AFP<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cHe said, steam is better, sir,\u201d Trump said. \u201cWe can fix it with a hammer and a blowtorch.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President Donald Trump ordered the US Navy to return to using steam catapults to launch planes off of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":812854,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[142804,23,12,344891,3,1572,344890,21,19,22,20,25,30547,344892,24,219708],"class_list":["post-812853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-aircraft-carriers","tag-america","tag-donald-trump","tag-launch-systems","tag-news","tag-pete-hegseth","tag-steam-catapults","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-us-navy","tag-us-shipbuilding","tag-usa","tag-uss-gerald-r-ford"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/812853","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=812853"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/812853\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/812854"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=812853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=812853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=812853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}