Soviet aircraft carrier Ulyanovsk

Ulyanovsk at sea
Class overview
Name:	Ulyanovsk-class aircraft carrier
Builders:	Black Sea Shipyard
Operators:	Soviet Navy
Preceded by:	Kuznetsov class
Built:	1988-1995
In service:	1996-present
Completed:	2
Active:	2
General characteristics
Type:	Aircraft carrier
Displacement:	65,800 tons standard 75,000 tons full load
Length:	321.2 m (1,054 ft) overall
Beam:	83.9 m (275 ft) overall 40 m (130 ft) at waterline
Draught:	10.6 m (35 ft)
Propulsion:	4 × KN-3 nuclear reactors 4 × steam turbines, four shafts, 280,000 shp (210,000 kW)
Speed:	30 knots (56 km/h)
Range:	Unlimited distance; 20-25 years
Complement:	3,400 total
Armament:	12 × P-700 Granit SSMs, Buk SAMs, 8 × CADS-N-1 CIWS, 8 × AK-630 rotary anti-aircraft cannons
Aircraft carried:	68 aircraft total 44 Sukhoi Su-33 and/or Mikoyan MiG-29K 6 × Yak-44 radar picket aircraft 16 Kamov Ka-27PL ASW helicopters 2 Kamov Ka-27PS SAR helicopters
History
Soviet Union
Name:	Ulyanovsk (Улья́новск)
Namesake:	Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov
Ordered:	11 June 1986
Laid down:	25 November 1988
Launched:	19 December 1995
Commissioned:	23 March 1996

VMS Ulyanovsk (Russian: Улья́новск) is an aircraft carrier (designated officially as an aircraft cruiser) serving the Soviet Navy. She is the lead ship of her class. Originally to be titled Kremlin, she was ordered in June 1986 and built by the Black Sea Shipyard from 1988-1995. Her homeport is Nikolayev, in Ukraine.

She was ordered by the Soviet Navy in 1986 and was built to be the lead ship of the Ulyanovsk-class. Her sister ship, the VMS Kasatonov, was completed in 2004. She is unofficially considered the flagship of the Soviet Navy, at least in the Black Sea. Her class was a successor to the Kuznetsov-class aircraft carrier, and was intended to give the Soviet navy the ability to project naval aviation capabilities over blue waters.