Winston Churchill had a project to produce a 2.2 million ton pykrete (ice and wood pulp) aircraft carrier that would have been 1200 meters long and 180 meters wide. This would have made it 3.5 times longer than the US Gerald Ford or Nimitz class carriers which are each about 330 meters long.
The final design of Habbakuk II (bergship) a displacement of 2.2 million tons. Steam turbogenerators were to supply 33,000 hp (25,000 kW) for 26 electric motors mounted in separate external nacelles (normal, internal ship engines would have generated too much heat for an ice craft). Its armament would have included 40 dual-barrelled 4.5" DP (dual-purpose) turrets and numerous light anti-aircraft guns, and it would have housed an airstrip and up to 150 twin-engined bombers or fighters.
In the 15 April 2009 episode of the U.S. TV show Mythbusters Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage built a small boat out of a modified version of pykrete, using newspaper instead of wood pulp. They successfully piloted the boat in Alaskan waters at a speed of 25 miles per hour (40 km/h) and inferred that it is possible to build a boat out of pykrete. They also concluded that pykrete lived up to its purported properties of being bullet-proof, stronger than ice and taking longer to melt than ice. However, they expressed doubt that an aircraft carrier made of pykrete could have survived for long. The conclusion was "Plausible, but ludicrous.
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The final design of Habbakuk II (bergship) a displacement of 2.2 million tons. Steam turbogenerators were to supply 33,000 hp (25,000 kW) for 26 electric motors mounted in separate external nacelles (normal, internal ship engines would have generated too much heat for an ice craft). Its armament would have included 40 dual-barrelled 4.5" DP (dual-purpose) turrets and numerous light anti-aircraft guns, and it would have housed an airstrip and up to 150 twin-engined bombers or fighters.
In the 15 April 2009 episode of the U.S. TV show Mythbusters Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage built a small boat out of a modified version of pykrete, using newspaper instead of wood pulp. They successfully piloted the boat in Alaskan waters at a speed of 25 miles per hour (40 km/h) and inferred that it is possible to build a boat out of pykrete. They also concluded that pykrete lived up to its purported properties of being bullet-proof, stronger than ice and taking longer to melt than ice. However, they expressed doubt that an aircraft carrier made of pykrete could have survived for long. The conclusion was "Plausible, but ludicrous.
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