Warship starts to take shape
The “largest and most powerful warship” ever built for the Royal Navy is beginning to take shape as two massive sections of HMS Queen Elizabeth were joined together yesterday.
It took about 90 minutes to move a 4,087-tonne section of the hull of the aircraft carrier 328ft (100m) via 132 remote-controlled transporters to join another section of the ship at BAE Systems’ Govan Shipyard in Glasgow.
Engineers will now spend the next week ensuring that the sections are perfectly aligned before welding them together into a 263ft (80m) long, 11,500-tonne section.
Project director Steven Carroll said it was a “major milestone” in the construction.
The ship is due to be completed by 2016, with another aircraft carrier, HMS Prince of Wales, following later.