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NavSource Online: Aircraft Carrier Photo Archive

UNITED STATES (CVA-58)

Ordered	Laid down	Cancelled
*United States Class Aircraft Carrier*
10 Aug 1948	18 Apr 1949	23 Apr 1949
Builder: Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co., Newport News, Va.

United States was the Navy's first carrier of post-World War II concept and design. Intended to operate in a pure strategic role, carrying jet-propelled, long-range, 100,000-pound bombers that never came to fruition, and usually envisaged as having no tactical (non-nuclear) role, she was an object of controversy between the military services and was strongly opposed by the Air Force. Only five days after her keel had been laid down, Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson cancelled her construction in favor of building a large force of land-based B-36 bombers. The small amount of material already worked into the United States was subsequently broken up in her building dock. CVA-58 would have been, at the time of her scheduled completion, the world's largest aircraft carrier.
It is not clear whether the "A" in her new designation, "CVA," stood for "Attack" or "Atomic."
The design was completely flushed decked, with folding funnels and a retractable pilothouse. The flight deck was axial, not angled. There were two catapults forward for bombers and two "waist" catapults for fighters, one on each side amidships, angled out. There were four elevators. The ship would have a heavy gun armament and would carry fighters for self-defense and strike escort.
Three additional ships of this design were apparently planned but not ordered because the entire program was cancelled. They would have been the center of four task forces, each comprising one CVA-58 and two smaller carriers, either Midways or SCB-27As.

Specifications
(Contract Design, March 1949)
Displacement: 79,000 tons
Dimensions (wl): 1,030' x 125' x ? / 313.9 x 38.1 x ? meters
Dimensions (max.): 1.080' x 190' / 329.2 x 57.9 meters
Armor: 2" flight deck; 1.5" hangar deck; 1.5" protective deck(s) (3" over magazines and gasoline); 60-lb hull-side belt, 30-lb & 25-lb hangar sides
Power plant: 8 boilers (1,200 psi, 950°F); 4 steam turbines; 4 shafts; 280,000 shp
Speed: 33 knots
Endurance (design): 12,000 nautical miles @ 20 knots
Armament: 8 single 5"/54 gun mounts; 8 twin 3"/70 gun mounts; 20 single 20-mm guns mounts
Aircraft: 18 bombers (ADR-62, 100,000 lb) + 80 fighters (F2H-1)
Aviation facilities: 3 deck-edge, 1 aft elevators; 4 H-9 hydraulic catapults (flight deck)
Crew: 4,000+ (ship's company + air wing)

Click on image for full-size image	Size	Image description	Contributed by and/or Copyright
Name
NS098654911	47k	CVA-58 was named *United States* on 2 February 1949, the third US warship to bear the name. US Frigate United States was one of six frigates authorized by Congress on 27 March 1794 and the first American warship launched under the naval provisions of the Constitution. She was launched and commissioned in 1797 and was not ordered broken up until 1865. NS098654911: USF United States, left, engaging HMS Macedonian, 26 October 1812. Image from Frigates of the Napoleonic Wars, by Robert Gardiner, via Robert Hurst. The second United States (CC-6) would have been a Lexington-class battle cruiser but her construction was cancelled under the terms of the Washington Treaty for the Limitation of Naval Armaments of 1922.	NavSource
Design & Construction
NS025805	1.74M	Plans for the aircraft carrier USS *United States* (CVA-58), 1947. Architectural and Engineering Drawings. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), Record Group 19. NS025805: Sheet 1. ARC Identifier: 167818897. NS025805a: Sheet 2. ARC Identifier: 167818899. NS025805b: Preliminary Design Drawings, July, 18 September, 2 October, 10 October, 15 December 1947.	NARA
NS025805a	1.33M		NARA
NS025805b	1.14M		Robert Hurst
NS025802	104k	Preliminary design model of the future USS *United States* (CVA-58) undergoing seakeeping tests at the David Taylor Model Basin, Carderock, Maryland, circa 1947. This is an early version of the CVA-58 design, without catapult sponsons. Aircraft models on the flight deck appear to represent the F7U fighter and a notional heavy attack bomber. Copied from photographs in File F-3, B-36 Carrier Characteristics File in the records of OP-23, held by the Operational Archives Branch, Naval Historical Center, 1982. NS025802: Note the folding smokestacks in the "up" position. U.S. Naval History & Heritage Command photo (# NH 93831). NS025802a: Note the folding smokestacks in the "down" position, as they would have been during flight operations. U.S. Naval History & Heritage Command photo (# NH 93832). NS025802b: Note the folding smokestacks in the "up" position and large amount of water splashed out around the bow. U.S. Naval History & Heritage Command photo (# NH 93833). NS025802c: Note the folding smokestacks in the "down" position. U.S. Naval History & Heritage Command photo (# NH 93834).	Courtesy of Scott Koen & ussnewyork.com
NS025802a	88k
NS025802b	57k
NS025802c	56k
NS025803	602k	Artist's conception of the future USS *United States* (CVA-58) by Bruno Figallo, October 1948, showing the ship's approximate planned configuration as of that time. Many details, among them the location of smoke stacks, elevators and the retractable bridge, were then still not finally decided. Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), # 80-G-706108.	Carl Muller Scott Koen & ussnewyork.com NARA, via Michael Mohl
NS025806	570k	The January 1949 issue of Popular Science Monthly included a 7-page article, "Why the Navy Wants Supercarriers," about the projected USS *United States*.	Yu Chu
NS025804	104k	Workmen lay the ship's 15-ton keel plate and initial shell plate, in a construction dry dock at the Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company shipyard, Newport News, Virginia, 18 April 1949. The carrier was cancelled a few days later, on 23 April. Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives (# 80-G-707175).	Gerd Matthes, Germany Scott Koen & ussnewyork.com
NS025805a	124k	Ship's keel plate being laid in a construction dry dock at the Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company shipyard, Newport News, Virginia, 18 April 1949. The carrier was cancelled a few days later, on 23 April. Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives (# 80-G-707176).	Carl Muller Scott Koen & ussnewyork.com
NS025807	1.10M	"KEEL OF WORLD'S BIGGEST AIRCRAFT CARRIER LAID—WITHOUT CEREMONY, the keel of the USS *United States, world's biggest aircraft carrier, is laid at the plant of the Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company in Newport News, Va. The 65,000-ton super-flattop has been the center of a hot controversy between the Navy and the Air Force. The Air Force claims the $186,000,000 Naval carrier is an invasion of the field of long-range strategic bombing to which the Air Force claims exclusive rights. The vessel will be big enough to handle bombers capable of carrying the atom bombs." The Key West Citizen*, Thursday, 21 April 1949, page 10.	Chronicling America, via Michael Mohl