Flight Operations
Aircraft are often launched from the carrier in a somewhat random order based on their deck positioning prior to launch. Therefore, aircraft working together on the same mission must rendezvous airborne. This is accomplished at a pre-determined location, usually at the in flight refueling tanker, overhead the carrier, or at an en route location. Properly equipped F/A-18E/F Super Hornets provide "organic" refueling, or U.S. Air Force (or other nation's) tankers provide "non-organic" tanking. After rendezvous/tanking, aircraft proceed on mission.
All aircraft within the carrier's radar coverage (typically several hundred miles) are tracked and monitored. As aircraft enter the Carrier Control Area, a 50 nmi radius around the carrier, they are given more scrutiny. Once airwing aircraft have been identified, they are normally turned over to "Marshal Control" for further clearance to the "marshal pattern".
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“Plot, rules, nor even poetry, are not half so great beauties in tragedy or comedy as a just imitation of nature, of character, of the passions and their operations in diversified situations.”
—Horace Walpole (1717–1797)