Alfegos Aerofleet
From Nova
Contents
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Introduction
The airfleet was originally part of the Military Aviation Cadre, which was started in 1884 with the original role of using hydrogen ballons for observation of battlefields, giving the military great advantage. Soon, with the introduction of airships in 1903, it became a more mobile force. During naval battles, when airships floated over enemy lines to drop grenades and crude munitions, the concept of the battle airship was created. Originally used in naval battles due to their range beyond battleship guns and their imperviousness to most able to shoot them, they were designated naval names in their purposes. With the intorduction of airplanes however, airships had to be fortified more and more until they sembled floating fortresses, without any mobility and with poor payloads, reaching up to 1.4km on the Fegos class airship, a one-off aero-battlecraft destroyed when hurricane-force winds ripped the fragile structure in two offshore, with the loss of all hands in 1946. However, with the introduction of light materials in the late 1950s, along with the division of the airforce into the airforce it is now and the aerofleet, things began to look up for the airships, used in jungle battles to great advantage, as well as offshore against small attacking ships. Due to their large size and the relative small amount of ammunition on guerillas, as well as their ability to cruise for months over forest and sea on the wind with minimal use of their engines, they were the ultimate weapons against guerillas. In the 21st century, airships are still used to immense effect in most theartres of war, supporting troops as well as pounding enemy defences into dust with the minimal of effect, using the many countermeasures of modern warfare as well as lightened structures and modern weaponry to become more deadly even than the lumbering fortresses of the early 20th century.
Airship Designation
Capital Ships
- Aero-Battlecraft - A large/very large airship with the focus on ground attack weaponry and on defence from ground targets, with less atention to the propulsion system and the air-air capabilities. Now being slowly phased out due to little use and poor defence against air targets, limiting operations alone, though it still has the capability for unimaginable bombardments upon the enemy.
- Aero-Cruiser - A medium-large craft designed to be self-sufficient, with focus on all systems. Still is vunerable to massed anti-air batteries and to large air attacks when alone, yet is used much more often.
Escorts
- Aero-Destroyer - A small airship armed exclusivly for air-air combat, and designed for speed. Most often seen as an escort to battleairships, it too is slowly being pahsed out, or craft being redesignated to other roles.
- Aero-Frigate - A small airship armed for all-round combat, for the protection of surface and air convoys. Fast and well-armed, its focus is on countermeasures and extremely-long range standoff, instead of armour.
- Aero-Patrolcraft - A very/extremely small airship with very light armament. Used primarily as an observation platform, it is upgraded with longrange visual equipment and often seen alongside aero-frigates. Also used as a shore/border patrol unit.
Other Combat Craft
- Stealthcraft - A craft designed to be almost transparent to RADAR, and very hard to detect visually and in Infared. Often powered by the wind, they carry observational equipment, with the option for upgrading with small numbers of missiles. They are nowadays normally UAVs.
- Aero-Dropcraft - A moderate sized craft designed to unload masses infantry (between a platoon and 3 companies) and deposit them onto the enemy position, giving support with a few missile pods. Usually designed for only a few-days flight, with the option of those carried onboard donating firepower from their own weaponry.
Phased-out Designations
- Ordinance Airship - An airship designed to carry masses of bombs and multiple heavy cannons, for short-range sorties onto enemy positions. Disbanded due to very poor range and due to the better qualities of the aero-cruisers, as well as the destructive amount of recoil from the guns.
- Electronic Warfare Airship - An airship class for deploying entire-battlefield countermeasures, normally electronically. Phased out due to the prevalence of single-unit countermeasures and the danger of the entire system being centralised in a single unit.
Fleet Auxilaries
- Ammunition craft - Carries munitions for loading onto other airships, normally in midair.
- Refuelling craft - Able to refuel airships and some aircraft in midair, carries a very large amount of Hydrogen, Kerosene and Helium. Usually unmanned due to extreme danger of being destroyed.
- Repair craft - As well as carrying out mid-air repairs on damaged ships, repair airships have very large amounts of excess payload so they can hold up critically damaged airships and take them to safe landing areas.
- Tranport craft - Of many various types, transporting both goods and troops.
Fleet Structure
The aerofleet is structured in the following method:
- Airship (A single ship)
- Aero-Group (2-5 airships) - The normal sized group of airships in small land operations.
- Aero-Taskforce (2-5 Air Groups) - A group normally assigned for normal land operations and for small naval operations.
- Aero-Flotilla (2-5 Air Taskforces) - A group used for large land operations and normal sea operations.
- Regional Aerofleet (2-5 Flotillas) - The size of group used for the defence of entire Alfegan provinces and for large naval battles.
- Aerofleet (The entire force)
Ranks
The airfleet has few different ranks, due to the few personnel actually invloved in the airships, so rising in rank in the aerofleet is usually a case of extreme experience, or when someone dies.
- Airman - The standard aerofleet personnel. Wears a navy-blue uniform with no bands on their shoulder rank-sliders. Airmen wear sky-blue caps.
- Captain - In charge of an airship, with a navy-blue uniform and single gold band on shoulder sliders. Wears a similar cap to the airmen.
- Group Captain - In charge of an Aero-group, with a navy-blue uniform with two gold bands.
- Taskforce Commander - In charge of an Aero-Taskforce, with a black uniform and orange sash, and three gold bands.
- Flotilla Commander - In charge of an Aero-Flotilla, with a black uniform, an orange sash, and four gold bands.
- Fleet Commander - In charge of a regional airfleet, with a black uniform, a silver/orange sash and five gold bands.
- Sky Marshall - The overall commander, with 6 gold bands, a golden sash and a black uniform.
Shoulder-sliders bear the rank and the name of the ship they are serving with: all officers serve on an airship of some type. Dress uniform is similar to normal uniform, but with higher-quality material and with increasing amounts of silver/gold cord relative to rank and battle honours.
Varients
In the logistics side of the aeronavy, officers of the same rank wear silver bands instead of gold bands on their uniform, and use silver braid instead of gold.
Training officials and those no longer assigned to a ship wear wavy bands on their shoulder pads.
Airship Maintenance and Storage
Airships in the Alfegos airfleet are kept in either of 5 massive hanger complexes, cut into the mountains of Alfegos with explosives providing massive natural caves for storage at very cheap prices. These ship storage complexes are:
- Station Solace I - 32km inland from the west coast, inthe Mountains of Solace, the station consists of three kilometre-long caverns cut into the side of mount Hi'loa, one of which is fitted out for heavy maintenance. Is mainly used to store airships up to 250m in length.
- Station Solace II - 82km inland from the west coast, the station consists of 4 x 2 kilometre-long tunnels, used for the storage of capitol ships. One of the tunnels is fitted with heavy airship maintenance machinery.
- Station Solace III - Sold off to a private firm in 1971, is located 19km inland from the east coast and consists of a pair of 1.4km long tunnels in the side of Mt. Tho'lar, neither fitted out for maintenance.
- Station Luna I - 19km from the west coast, in the Mountains of the Moon. The station consists of an artificially-roof valley 300m deep and 3km long. Used as a depot for the fleet logistics vessels and as a storage hanger for small logistics airships.
- Station Luna II - 29km from the west coast, destroyed during the Alfegos civil war by earthquake bombing. Originally consisted of a single abandoned road tunnel 8km long that was expanded by the communists, to store massive capitol airships.
- Station Luna III - 33km from the east coast, was sold off in 1989 to commerical interests. Consists of three tunnels 800m long, with one fitted out for maintenance.
- Station Cupola I - 8km inland and 16km from the eastedge of New Alfegosian territory in the cupola mountains. Consists of 7 x 1.1km long tunnels blown into the mountainside by the destruction of old mines found there, with 2 hangers used for maintenance. Used for all types of ships.
List of Airship Names
Aero-battlecraft
Fego-class
- AAS Fegos (Launched 1942, Destroyed 1946)
Admiral-class
- AAS Alfegos (Launched 1963, Destroyed 1972)
- AAS Polinas (Launched 1963, Destroyed 1988)
- AAS Zevkhay (Launched 1964, Decommisioned 1990)
- AAS Milkavich (Launched 1965, Decommisioned 1996)
President-class
- AAS Holocaust (Launched 1987)
- AAS Inferno (Launched 1988, Decommisioned 2001)
- AAS Firestorm (Launched 1988, Decommisioned 2002)
- AAS Incinerator (Launched 1989, Decommisioned 2007)
