PROJECT 1153 OREL

'Project 1153 OREL' (Cyrillic: Орёл) was a 1970s-era Soviet program to give the Soviet Navy a true blue water aviation capability. The ship would have been about 75-80,000 tons displacement, with a nuclear power plant and carried about 70 aircraft launched via steam catapults. It was cancelled as being too expensive and a reduced version of 60,000 tons and fifty aircraft was proposed. This was also turned down for cost reasons.
OREL would have resulted in a program very similar to the aircraft carriers available to the U.S. Navy. While the project never saw fruition, it later resulted in the abortive ''Ulyanovsk'' program. The name "Orel" means "Eagle," The Russians named all of their major warship classes after birds (see Russian ship naming conventions)

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External links

External links

★ "Project 1143.7 Orel Ul'yanovsk class," GlobalSecurity.org.

★ "A Brief Look at Russian Aircraft Carrier Development," Robin J. Lee.