WaltBJ wrote:
Ref: Aluminum construction - I should think that the incident with the
Belknap would have put the kibosh on aluminum construction. After the
collision they could have rebuilt it with a flight deck - the AL
superstructure was damn near zeroed.

Pour burning aviation fuel over any structure like that and it's going to be
totaled. Aluminum just accelerated the process.

But Belknap *was* the impetus for the reduction of aluminum in USN ships.
The problem was that the next class of ships built (the Ticonderoga-class
cruiser) was required to be based on the Spruance hull, which could not
carry the necessary payload with a steel superstructure. Thus, the Ticos
still had aluminum.

The Burkes, the next clean-sheet design for the USN, are almost all steel.

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"Our country, right or wrong. When right, to be kept right, when
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