Air department Sailors ensure the safety of the flight deck as an E-2C Hawkeye assigned to Carrier Airborne Early Warning Squadron (VAW) 120 lands aboard the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77).

Aircraft carriers are warships that act as airbases for carrier-based aircraft. In the United States Navy, these consist of ships commissioned with hull classification symbols CV (aircraft carrier), CVA (attack aircraft carrier), CVB (large aircraft carrier), CVL (light aircraft carrier), CVN (aircraft carrier (nuclear propulsion) and CVAN (attack aircraft carrier (nuclear propulsion). The first aircraft carrier commissioned into the United States Navy was USS Langley (CV-1) on 20 March 1922.