SINGAPORE — China has officially commissioned its third aircraft carrier, the first to use catapults for launching aircraft.
The Fujian was commissioned in a ceremony attended by Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Yulin Naval Base on the island of Hainan on Wednesday, according to reports from China’s state-run media outlets.
The Fujian measures approximately 316 meters (1,037 feet) long and has a beam of around 76 meters (249 feet), based on satellite imagery during the ship’s construction, with estimates in state media putting its displacement at 80,000 tons full load.
The ship is fitted with three electromagnetic catapults to launch its aircraft, which enable heavier or less-powerful aircraft such as the Xi’an KJ-600 airborne early warning aircraft to operate from it.
Fujian was built at Shanghai’s Jiangnan Changxing shipyard and was launched back in June 2022. The choice of Yulin as its commissioning location strongly suggests the ship will now become part of the PLAN’s South Sea Fleet, whose area of responsibility includes the South China Sea and Taiwan Strait.
The base is equipped with a newly constructed dry dock large enough to accommodate the carrier and is also the homeport of another aircraft carrier, the Shandong. The nearby airbase at Lingshui has been upgraded in recent years to house and conduct carrier operations training for PLAN carrier aircraft.
The carrier, which is named after the eastern Chinese province directly across the strait from Taiwan, will become the third aircraft carrier in service with the People’s Liberation Army – Navy (PLAN) after the Liaoning and Shandong.
Both older carriers are less capable than the Fujian, having smaller air wings and lacking catapults, which limits their aircraft operations.
The commissioning of the Fujian took place two months after state media showed clips of PLAN aircraft conducting flight operations on board Fujian during its sea trials, including catapult launches of the Shenyang J-15T and J-35 fighter aircraft as well as the KJ-600.