Nimitz-Class Aircraft Carrier

The Nimitz class is a class of American nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, the lead ship USS Nimitz commissioned in 1975, and for decades the largest warships ever built, powered by two nuclear reactors that give the ships an operational range effectively limited only by the crew's food and other consumable supplies rather than by fuel, allowing sustained high-speed operations without the refueling stops a conventionally powered carrier would require. Ten ships of the class were eventually built, each capable of carrying and operating an air wing of roughly sixty to ninety aircraft, and the class formed the core of American carrier strike group power projection capability for the last quarter of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first, participating in essentially every major American military operation over that span, from the Gulf War through the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Nimitz class is being succeeded by the newer Gerald R. Ford class, whose first ship entered service in 2017, but Nimitz-class carriers are expected to remain in front-line American service for years to come as the older class is gradually retired.