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Description
Type: Nuclear-powered aircraft carrier
Displacement: 107,800 tons full
Length: 332.8 m o/a, 317 m w/l
Beam: 76.8 m o/a
40.8 m w/l
Complement: 4,956 in total
Propulsion: 2 × nuclear pressurized water reactors
4 × steam turbines
Speed: 32.5 knots

The Type 1998 Leiyu-class (Putonghua: 雷雨) nuclear-powered aircraft carrier is a series of large warships created by Yongsheng Heavy Machinery Industries. Equipped with a full-length flight deck and facilities for carrying, arming, deploying, and recovering aircraft, the carrier was designed to serve as a seagoing airbase.

The angled flight decks of the carrier uses a Catapult Assisted Take-Off But Arrested Recovery (CATOBAR) arrangement to operate fixed-wing aircraft, with four aircraft catapults utilized for launching fixed-wing aircraft and four arresting cables utilized for landing recovery. As well as speeding up flight deck operations, this provides great flexibility in carrier operations and allows fixed-wing aircraft to take-off and land with a high payload of fuel and ordnance. The carrier features larger stores of aviation fuel and large ordnance magazines while each hangar is divided into three fire bays by thick steel doors that are designed to restrict the spread of fire.

The Leiyu-class is manufactured with modular construction with each module section welded together. In order to be efficiently built and assembled, the module sections are independently constructed in lay-down areas, prior to being hoisted into place and welded together.

Up to 90 aircraft of different types can be carried onboard, although the Leiyu-class has a standard accommodation of generally around 65 aircraft. The flight deck, which uses non-slip heat-resistant material to ensure safety for both crew members and aircraft, is at an angle that allows for aircraft to be launched and recovered simultaneously while large elevators transport aircraft between the flight deck and the hangars below.

Thanks to a streamlined movement of weapons from storage and assembly to the aircraft on the flight deck, ordnance can be moved to a centralized rearming location via high-capacity weapons elevators that use linear motors. Because of the highly-efficient weapon-handling procedures, the path that an ordnance follows does not cross any areas of aircraft movement, thereby preventing traffic problems in the hangars and on the flight deck. The weapons elevators allow ordnance to move from storage areas to dedicated weapons-handling areas while crewmembers would utilize motorized carts to move the weapons from storage to the weapons elevators at different levels of the ordnance magazines.

In addition to the aircraft carried on board, the warship is equipped with self-defense weapons for use against missiles and hostile aircraft. These consist of two eight-cell missile launchers for medium-range surface-to-air missiles, two 30mm six-barrel rotary-cannon CIWS and two Type 348 surface-to-air missile CIWS.

Leiyu, the lead ship, was launched on June 12, 1998 and commissioned on May 9, 2001.

Description
Type: Nuclear-powered aircraft carrier
Displacement: 107,800 tons full
Length: 332.8 m o/a, 317 m w/l
Beam: 76.8 m o/a
40.8 m w/l
Complement: 4,956 in total
Propulsion: 2 × nuclear pressurized water reactors
4 × steam turbines
Speed: 32.5 knots

The Type 1998 Leiyu-class (Putonghua: 雷雨) nuclear-powered aircraft carrier is a series of large warships created by Yongsheng Heavy Machinery Industries. Equipped with a full-length flight deck and facilities for carrying, arming, deploying, and recovering aircraft, the carrier was designed to serve as a seagoing airbase.

The angled flight decks of the carrier uses a Catapult Assisted Take-Off But Arrested Recovery (CATOBAR) arrangement to operate fixed-wing aircraft, with four aircraft catapults utilized for launching fixed-wing aircraft and four arresting cables utilized for landing recovery. As well as speeding up flight deck operations, this provides great flexibility in carrier operations and allows fixed-wing aircraft to take-off and land with a high payload of fuel and ordnance. The carrier features larger stores of aviation fuel and large ordnance magazines while each hangar is divided into three fire bays by thick steel doors that are designed to restrict the spread of fire.

The Leiyu-class is manufactured with modular construction with each module section welded together. In order to be efficiently built and assembled, the module sections are independently constructed in lay-down areas, prior to being hoisted into place and welded together.

Up to 90 aircraft of different types can be carried onboard, although the Leiyu-class has a standard accommodation of generally around 65 aircraft. The flight deck, which uses non-slip heat-resistant material to ensure safety for both crew members and aircraft, is at an angle that allows for aircraft to be launched and recovered simultaneously while large elevators transport aircraft between the flight deck and the hangars below.

Thanks to a streamlined movement of weapons from storage and assembly to the aircraft on the flight deck, ordnance can be moved to a centralized rearming location via high-capacity weapons elevators that use linear motors. Because of the highly-efficient weapon-handling procedures, the path that an ordnance follows does not cross any areas of aircraft movement, thereby preventing traffic problems in the hangars and on the flight deck. The weapons elevators allow ordnance to move from storage areas to dedicated weapons-handling areas while crewmembers would utilize motorized carts to move the weapons from storage to the weapons elevators at different levels of the ordnance magazines.

In addition to the aircraft carried on board, the warship is equipped with self-defense weapons for use against missiles and hostile aircraft. These consist of two eight-cell missile launchers for medium-range surface-to-air missiles, two 30mm six-barrel rotary-cannon CIWS and two Type 348 surface-to-air missile CIWS.

Leiyu, the lead ship, was launched on June 12, 1998 and commissioned on May 9, 2001.