A helicopter carrier is a type of

aircraft carrier An aircraft carrier is a warship that serves as a seagoing airbase, equipped with a full-length flight deck and hangar facilities for supporting, arming, deploying and recovering carrier-based aircraft, shipborne aircraft. Typically it is the ...

whose primary purpose is to operate

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which Lift (force), lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning Helicopter rotor, rotors. This allows the helicopter to VTOL, take off and land vertically, to hover (helicopter), hover, and ...

s. It has a large

flight deck The flight deck of an aircraft carrier is the surface on which its aircraft take off and land, essentially a miniature airfield at sea. On smaller naval ships which do not have aviation as a primary mission, the landing area for helicopters ...

that occupies a substantial part of the deck, which can extend the full length of the ship like of the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King of the United Kingdom, King. Although warships were used by Kingdom ...

(RN), or extend only partway, usually aft, as in the

Soviet Navy The Soviet Navy was the naval warfare Military, uniform service branch of the Soviet Armed Forces. Often referred to as the Red Fleet, the Soviet Navy made up a large part of the Soviet Union's strategic planning in the event of a conflict with t ...

's or in the Chinese Navy's Type 0891A. It often also has a

hangar A hangar is a building or structure designed to hold aircraft or spacecraft. Hangars are built of metal, wood, or concrete. The word ''hangar'' comes from Middle French ''hanghart'' ("enclosure near a house"), of Germanic origin, from Frankish ...

deck for the storage and maintenance of rotorwing aircraft. Pure helicopter carriers are difficult to define in the 21st century. The advent of

STOVL A short take-off and vertical landing aircraft (STOVL aircraft) is a fixed-wing aircraft that is able to take off from a short runway (or take off vertically if it does not have a heavy payload) and land vertically (i.e. with no runway). The ...

aircraft such as the

Harrier jump jet The Harrier, informally referred to as the Harrier jump jet, is a family of jet-powered attack aircraft capable of vertical/short takeoff and landing operations (V/STOL). Named after the bird of prey, it was originally developed by British ...

, and now the F-35, have complicated the classification; the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the naval warfare, maritime military branch, service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is the world's most powerful navy with the largest Displacement (ship), displacement, at 4.5 millio ...

's , for instance, carries six to eight Harriers as well as over 20 helicopters. Only smaller carriers unable to operate the Harrier, and older, pre-Harrier-era carriers, can be regarded as true helicopter carriers. In many cases, other carriers, able to operate STOVL aircraft, are classified as "

light aircraft carrier A light aircraft carrier, or light fleet carrier, is an aircraft carrier smaller than the Fleet carrier, standard carriers of a navy. The precise definition of the type varies by country; light carriers typically have a complement of aircraft onl ...

s". Other vessels, such as the ''Wasp'' class, are also capable of embarking troops such as

marines Marines (or naval infantry) are military personnel generally trained to operate on both land and sea, with a particular focus on amphibious warfare. Historically, the main tasks undertaken by marines have included Raid (military), raiding ashor ...

and landing them ashore; they are classified as landing helicopter docks. Helicopter carriers have been used as

anti-submarine warfare carrier An anti-submarine warfare carrier (ASW carrier) (US hull classification symbol CVS) is a type of small aircraft carrier whose primary role is as the nucleus of an anti-submarine warfare hunter-killer group. This type of ship came into existence d ...

s and

amphibious assault ship An amphibious assault ship is a type of warship employed to land and support ground forces on enemy territory during an armed conflict. The design evolved from aircraft carriers converted for use as helicopter carriers (which, as a result, ar ...

s. and two of her sisters were 22,000 ton fleet carriers converted to "commando carriers" only able to operate helicopters. ''Hermes'' was later converted to a STOVL carrier.

Helicopter carriers by country

Helicopter carriers

Helicopter carriers currently in service

Retired helicopter carriers

* (

) – converted from light carrier and operating in helicopter carrier role from 1962 to 1973 * (

Italian Navy The Italian Navy (; abbreviated as MM) is one of the four branches of Italian Armed Forces and was formed in 1946 from what remained of the ''Regia Marina'' (Royal Navy) after World War II. , the Italian Navy had a strength of 30,923 active per ...

) – an helicopter cruiser active from 1964 to 1992 * (

) – landing helicopter dock, active 1998–2020 * (Royal Navy) – converted from light carrier and operating in helicopter carrier role from 1960 to 1981 * (Italian Navy) - an ''Andrea Doria''-class helicopter cruiser active from 1964 to 1989 * ( US Coast Guard), decommissioned in 1946 – world's first helicopter carrier. * (Royal Navy) – an light aircraft carrier, which operated as a helicopter carrier when HMS ''Ocean'' was being refitted. * (United States Navy) – lead of the seven-ship , active from the early 1960s to the early 2000s * (

French Navy The French Navy (, , ), informally (, ), is the Navy, maritime arm of the French Armed Forces and one of the four military service branches of History of France, France. It is among the largest and most powerful List of navies, naval forces i ...

), decommissioned in 2010 * (

) – second of the two-ship - active 1969–1991 * (Soviet Navy) – lead of the two-ship ''Moskva'' class, active 1967–1991 * ex- (Royal Navy) – helicopter carrier 1998–2018, decommissioned March 2018. ** Sold to Brazil in February 2018, renamed ''Atlântico'' * (Italian Navy) – a helicopter cruiser active from 1969 to 2003

Notes

References

External links

{{Warship types of the 19th & 20th centuries Aircraft carriers Aircraft carriers by type