Russia to Build Its First Nuclear Powered Aircraft Carrier by 2023

Russia will complete construction of its first nuclear powered aircraft carrier by 2023, the head of Russia’s United Shipbuilding Corporation said. 

Russian Project 1143.8 class Carrier

“We will start designing the Russian aircraft carrier in 2016, so that by 2018 we can start construction,” company head Roman Trotsenko said. He also said that as the construction period was likely to be five years, the carrier would be put into service in 2023.

The Russian navy has one conventionally powered aircraft carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov, construction of which began during the Soviet era and finished in the early 1990s. President Dmitry Medvedev said in 2008 that Russia would build new carriers for the navy but did not specify how they would be powered.

by Oleg Lastochkin (RiaNovosti)