The CV NATOPS manual (NAVAIR 00-80T-105), explained

The CV NATOPS Manual is the Navy's standard procedures manual for aircraft carrier operations, and the Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) publishes it as NAVAIR 00-80T-105. The general NATOPS manual, CNAF M-3710.7, uses it as the example of a General Series manual, the kind of NATOPS publication written for an aviation activity rather than for one aircraft. The manual itself is posted on the NAVAIR Airworthiness website, and no official public copy was found, so this page explains it through the public documents that name it: the general manual, the Navy's aviation safety manual, Naval Safety Command signal charts, and Navy stories about the certification a carrier earns before it may embark aircraft. Searchers who type "carrier natops" or "cv natops" are looking for this manual. Readers new to the program should start with what NATOPS is.

What the CV NATOPS manual is

CNAF M-3710.7, dated February 7, 2025, draws the line between the two kinds of NATOPS manual in paragraph 1.3.1. NATOPS flight manuals are issued for particular aircraft, with the MH-60S NATOPS Flight Manual as the example. General Series NATOPS manuals are issued for aviation-related activities, with the CV NATOPS Manual as the example. Both kinds, the paragraph says, contain the specific doctrine and the optimum operating procedures for the aircraft model or aviation activity concerned.

Paragraph 2.3.2 gives the formal definition. A NATOPS General Series Manual is "a manual issued for special aviation-related operations or systems that require fleet-wide standardization," and the manual lists three examples: Aircraft Refueling NATOPS, CV NATOPS, and LSO NATOPS. The carrier manual therefore stands beside the refueling manual and the landing signal officer manual as a procedures document for an activity that many squadrons, ships, and air wings share.

The same wording has been in the general instruction for years. The 2009 edition, OPNAVINST 3710.7U, dated November 23, 2009 and hosted by Headquarters Marine Corps Aviation, lists the same three examples in the same order: Aircraft Refueling NATOPS, CV NATOPS, Landing Signal Officer NATOPS. The carrier manual has been the general manual's standing example of a General Series manual across at least two editions of the instruction and the CNAF manual that replaced it.

The public documents cited here use "CV NATOPS" for the manual's title and "CVN" in the title of NAVAIR 00-80T-120 and in the hull numbers of the carriers in the certification stories, such as USS Nimitz (CVN 68) and USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70).

NAVAIR 00-80T-105 and NAVAIR 00-80T-120

The number 00-80T-105 does not appear in CNAF M-3710.7. The public document that supplies it is the Navy's aviation safety manual, OPNAV M-3750.6, dated October 24, 2024 and hosted by the Naval Safety Command. The resources list at the front of that manual numbers the directives it relies on and gives a link for each. Entry 32 is NAVAIR 00-80T-105, the CV NATOPS Manual, with a link into the publication library on the Airworthiness website. Entry 36 is NAVAIR 00-80T-120, the CVN Flight/Hangar Deck NATOPS Manual, with its own library link.

That list settles a question searchers often have. The carrier does not have one NATOPS manual but two, the CV NATOPS Manual and the CVN Flight/Hangar Deck NATOPS Manual. The safety manual's list also shows the neighbors in the series:

The same list carries three salvage and firefighting manuals in the 00-80R series. The titles show separate ship manuals for carriers, LHA/LHD ships, and air-capable ships. CNAF M-3710.7 adds five more 00-80T titles in its own Appendix C: NAVAIR 00-80T-112, the NATOPS Instrument Flight Manual; 00-80T-113, the Aircraft Signals NATOPS Manual; 00-80T-123, the Aircrew Systems NATOPS Manual; 00-80T-125, the Air Traffic Control Afloat NATOPS Manual; and 00-80T-126, the Aircraft Operating Procedures for LPD/ESB Ships NATOPS Manual.

A note on what this page does not do. The public documents fetched for it name the carrier manuals, place them in the NATOPS system, and show the activity they govern. They do not reproduce the chapter list of NAVAIR 00-80T-105 or 00-80T-120, and copies posted on file-sharing sites are not cited because their edition and completeness cannot be checked. Statements about the manuals' contents below are limited to what the Navy says in public.

Who holds the manual and where it lives

CNAF M-3710.7 chapter 2 assigns the roles that apply to every NATOPS product, the carrier manual included. Paragraph 2.2.1 names the NAVAIR Airworthiness and CYBERSAFE Office (ACO) as the NATOPS Products Administrator, and paragraph 2.2.2 lists its duties: release authority for NATOPS interim changes, preparing Letters of Promulgation, compiling the NATOPS Status Report, and maintaining the Airworthiness website that provides NATOPS and other airworthiness products to the Fleet. Commander, Naval Air Forces (N455) is the NATOPS Program Administrator for day-to-day policy.

The manual's home is the Airworthiness website, which paragraph 2.3.1 calls the primary information conduit for all participants in the NATOPS program. NATOPS products, interim changes, the Program Manager's Handbook, the Airworthiness Issue Resolution System (AIRS), the NATOPS Status Report, and the Review schedule are all posted there. OPNAV M-3750.6 links the carrier manuals into that same library. No official public copy was found, which is why none is linked on this page.

Format is controlled separately from content. Paragraph 1.3.8 points to the ACO NATOPS Style Guide, the Department of the Navy detail specification that holds the style, format, and content standards for all NATOPS flight manuals, General Series manuals, and checklists. Anyone preparing or modifying a General Series manual is required to be familiar with it.

Users have an obligation too. Paragraph 2.5 says any NATOPS product user who notes a deficiency or an error is obligated to submit a change recommendation, and paragraph 1.1.2 makes AIRS the preferred route, with a naval message or Form OPNAV 3710/6 as the fallback. A flight deck officer who finds a wrong procedure in the carrier manual has the same duty as a pilot who finds one in a flight manual.

How the CV NATOPS relates to the LSO NATOPS manual

CNAF M-3710.7 lists CV NATOPS and LSO NATOPS side by side as General Series manuals, and the public record shows how the two activities meet. A NAVAIR story from March 14, 2013 about the landing signal officer trainer at Naval Air Station Oceana defines the LSO as a Navy or Marine Corps pilot whose primary responsibility is the safe and expeditious recovery of nonvertical, short take-off and landing aircraft aboard U.S. aircraft carriers. The LSO is also responsible for training pilots in shipboard approaches, carrier-landing techniques, shipboard flight deck procedures, and Field Carrier Landing Practice, and for training other LSOs. The trainer, developed by the Naval Aviation Training Systems Program Office (PMA-205), simulates the look and feel of standing on a carrier flight deck.

The LSO School at Oceana is where that training starts. A DVIDS story dated February 23, 2024 calls the school the launching pad for all LSOs in the U.S. Navy and says it had been training Navy pilots for 79 years. A Navy story on the school's officer in charge describes him aboard USS Abraham Lincoln during carrier qualifications from March 17 to 23.

The safety manual shows the LSO NATOPS manual at work after a mishap. In its chapter on safety investigations, OPNAV M-3750.6 says summarized statements from the controlling LSO, the senior LSO present, the landing signalman enlisted, and the taxi director may be used whenever mishaps occur to aircraft under their control, and that those statements should include, if appropriate, the applicable items requested by section VII of the LSO NATOPS Manual.

The relationship is one of adjacent manuals rather than one manual inside another: CNAF M-3710.7 lists both as General Series manuals, under the same administrator and the same change process. CNAF M-3710.7 does not give the LSO manual's NAVAIR number, so this page does not either.

How the CV NATOPS relates to the Aircraft Signals manual

The third manual a flight deck runs on is the Aircraft Signals NATOPS Manual, NAVAIR 00-80T-113. CNAF M-3710.7 paragraph 7.1.2.6, on taxiing, says instructions and use of plane handling signals appear in NAVAIR 00-80T-113 and in posters and pamphlets issued by the Chief of Naval Operations, and it directs all naval activities to comply with them. Appendix C lists the manual by title.

The Naval Safety Command publishes the carrier end of that signal set as a public chart. Hand Signals Chart 3, titled Flight Deck Handling Signals, is organized by who signals whom. Under Arrested Landing Signals, the gear puller signals the arresting gear officer by sweeping an arm from overhead to the side, and at night does the same with an amber wand. The hook runner signals the gear puller with a fore-to-aft sweeping motion, palms aft, and at night with a red stubby wand. In the reverse thrust taxi signal, a director faces the pilot with palms toward the aircraft at eye level in a pushback motion and, for turns, points in the direction the tail is to move. The chart has sections for aircraft elevator signals on CVN and LHA/LHD ships and for flight deck refueling signals, and it closes with the instruction to refer to NAVAIR 00-80T-113. A separate post covers the Aircraft Signals manual in detail.

The jobs named on the chart match the jersey colors described in Navy stories, which a separate post on flight deck jersey colors covers. The arresting gear officer and the gear puller belong to the recovery team covered in the post on catapults and arresting gear.

Flight deck certification, the manual in practice

The procedures a carrier manual standardizes are visible in the certification a ship earns before it operates aircraft. A U.S. Pacific Fleet story on USS Carl Vinson, which completed flight deck certification (FDC) and carrier air traffic control center certification on September 17, 2020, says FDC is required for the carrier to embark aircraft and is designed to provide operational continuity and proficiency training for carrier crews. During FDC the carrier is evaluated on its ability to launch and recover aircraft safely in both day and night operations. The ship's DVIDS release on the same event adds that four Carrier Air Wing 2 squadrons earned precision approach landing system certification and six fixed-wing squadrons completed carrier qualifications during the same underway.

Two earlier Navy stories give the certification in numbers. When USS Nimitz certified on October 20 after a 20-month maintenance period, ahead of a 2017 deployment, the Air Department was required to catch 50 aircraft on the first day of flight operations, 70 the following day, and 40 by the end of the second night, and had 399 catches total by the fifth day. The story says the certification proves the flight deck and the Sailors who conduct flight operations are capable of safely launching and recovering aircraft. While in the yard, the department had recertified four aircraft elevators and overhauled the catapults, arresting gear, safety nets, and jet blast deflectors.

USS Abraham Lincoln certified from June 1 to 12 after a four-year refueling and complex overhaul; the last jet had landed aboard on August 6, 2012. The Air Department was required to catch 50 aircraft on the first day and 110 the next, 40 of them at night, and finished with 160 catches. The story notes that only 60 or 70 percent of the Sailors had seen flight operations before.

None of these stories cites the CV NATOPS manual by name, and this page does not claim they do. What they show is the activity the manual exists to standardize: launching and recovering aircraft by day and by night, with a department of Sailors who turn over faster than the procedures do. That turnover is the case for a General Series manual. CNAF M-3710.7 says such manuals are issued for operations that require fleet-wide standardization, and the Nimitz story says about 30 to 40 percent of the Sailors had never seen the flight deck doing flight operations after the yard period.

Revisions, and what public sources state

Searchers ask which edition of the carrier manual is current. The public documents fetched for this page do not answer that with a date, and this page does not guess one. What they do give is the mechanism.

CNAF M-3710.7 paragraph 2.3.4 defines three ways a NATOPS product is updated. An interim change is initiated by an urgent or priority change recommendation and issued by rapid means, normally a message with replacement pages, and interim changes are numbered consecutively for the life of the publication. A change is limited to the pages containing revised information and carries a change number on the title page and each changed page. A revision is a complete new edition that incorporates all previous interim changes and changes, indicated only by a new date on the title page. Paragraph 2.5.4 sets the speeds: a release goal of 3 days for an urgent change that immediately affects safety of flight and 30 days for a priority change. Routine recommendations wait in AIRS for the next NATOPS Review, which the manual says is typically held every 2 to 3 years.

For a reader who holds a copy, that gives three places to look. The title page date identifies the revision. The interim change summary page lists the interim changes incorporated. And a note in paragraph 2.3.4.3 says the summary page should be checked against the NATOPS Status Report on the Airworthiness website to determine whether the manual contains the latest update.

OPNAV M-3750.6 adds one external marker. The links it gives for NAVAIR 00-80T-105 and 00-80T-120 carry a version identifier in the Airworthiness library address. A reader with access can follow those links to the library entries the October 24, 2024 safety manual points to.

Carrier manual, air wing, and squadron manuals

The carrier manual is one layer of the documents that govern a launch. CNAF M-3710.7 paragraph 1.3.1 sets the rule between layers: individual aircraft NATOPS requirements should be at least as stringent as the general manual, and if a NATOPS Review wants a less stringent requirement, approval must come from Commander, Naval Air Forces. Paragraph 2.3.2 says a NATOPS flight manual carries the aircraft's operating procedures and limitations, paragraph 1.3.1 says General Series manuals carry the procedures for the aviation activity, and paragraph 1.3 says the general manual is not intended to replace or duplicate either.

The post on the carrier air wing covers the air wing that embarks. The safety manual shows how the layers come together after a mishap: OPNAV M-3750.6 requires at least one member of an aircraft mishap board for a manned aircraft mishap to be a pilot or naval flight officer who is NATOPS-qualified in the model aircraft involved, and it points LSO statements to the LSO NATOPS items described above.

What to check

• Which carrier manual is meant: NAVAIR 00-80T-105, the CV NATOPS Manual, or NAVAIR 00-80T-120, the CVN Flight/Hangar Deck NATOPS Manual? OPNAV M-3750.6 lists both.
• Does the copy in hand carry a Letter of Promulgation? CNAF M-3710.7 paragraph 2.3.3.3 says promulgated NATOPS products are approved permanent flight clearances, and paragraph 2.3.3.1 says a draft without a letter of promulgation is not an approved flight clearance.
• Does the interim change summary page match the NATOPS Status Report on the Airworthiness website?
• Is a procedure attributed to the carrier manual actually in the Aircraft Signals manual, NAVAIR 00-80T-113, or in the LSO NATOPS manual? The Naval Safety Command chart sends readers to 00-80T-113 for the signals.
• Does a claim about a carrier's certification cite the ship's own release? The Nimitz, Lincoln, and Carl Vinson stories give different catch counts and days.
• For a ship other than a carrier, is the right manual cited: 00-80T-106 for LHA/LHD ships, 00-80T-122 for air-capable ships, or 00-80T-126 for LPD/ESB ships?

Azcuna's ELLMENT, the E-2D Large Language Model Entity, was proposed to NAVAIR PMA-231 under Navy SBIR Phase I topic DON26BZ01-NV010. The prototype, built at private expense on publicly available doctrine, answers with a page-level citation and refuses when the documents do not support an answer. The proposal has been submitted.

Questions people ask

What is the CV NATOPS manual?

The CV NATOPS Manual is the General Series NATOPS manual for aircraft carrier operations. CNAF M-3710.7, the NATOPS General Flight and Operating Instructions Manual dated February 7, 2025, uses it as the example of a General Series manual, which it defines as a manual issued for special aviation-related operations or systems that require fleet-wide standardization. OPNAV M-3750.6, the Naval Aviation Safety Program manual, lists it by number as NAVAIR 00-80T-105.

What is NAVAIR 00-80T-105?

NAVAIR 00-80T-105 is the publication number of the CV NATOPS Manual. OPNAV M-3750.6, dated October 24, 2024, lists it under that number among the NATOPS manuals it references and points to the manual's entry in the NAVAIR Airworthiness website library. The 00-80T series also holds other NATOPS manuals, such as 00-80T-113, the Aircraft Signals NATOPS Manual, and 00-80T-114, the Air Traffic Control (ATC) Facilities Manual.

What is the difference between the CV NATOPS manual and the CVN Flight/Hangar Deck NATOPS manual?

They are two different publications. OPNAV M-3750.6 lists NAVAIR 00-80T-105 as the CV NATOPS Manual and NAVAIR 00-80T-120 as the CVN Flight/Hangar Deck NATOPS Manual, each with its own entry on the Airworthiness website. The public documents fetched for this page give only the two titles and do not reproduce either manual's table of contents, so the scope of each has to be read from the manuals themselves.

What is a General Series NATOPS manual?

CNAF M-3710.7 paragraph 2.3.2 defines a NATOPS General Series Manual as one issued for special aviation-related operations or systems that require fleet-wide standardization, and gives Aircraft Refueling NATOPS, CV NATOPS, and LSO NATOPS as examples. Paragraph 1.3.1 contrasts General Series manuals, issued for aviation-related activities, with NATOPS flight manuals, issued for particular aircraft such as the MH-60S. Both contain doctrine and optimum operating procedures for the aircraft or activity concerned.

Who maintains the CV NATOPS manual?

CNAF M-3710.7 assigns the NATOPS Products Administrator role to the NAVAIR Airworthiness and CYBERSAFE Office, which is release authority for interim changes, prepares Letters of Promulgation, compiles the NATOPS Status Report, and maintains the Airworthiness website where NATOPS products are posted. Commander, Naval Air Forces (N455) is the NATOPS Program Administrator. Any NATOPS product user who finds an error is obligated to submit a change recommendation, preferably through the Airworthiness Issue Resolution System.

Where can I download the CV NATOPS manual?

The manual is posted on the NAVAIR Airworthiness website, which CNAF M-3710.7 describes as the primary information conduit for the NATOPS program. OPNAV M-3750.6 gives a direct library link for NAVAIR 00-80T-105 on that site. No official public copy was found for this page, and copies on file-sharing sites are not cited here because their edition and completeness cannot be verified.

What does the LSO NATOPS manual cover?

CNAF M-3710.7 names LSO NATOPS as a General Series manual alongside CV NATOPS. A 2013 NAVAIR story defines the landing signal officer as a Navy or Marine Corps pilot whose primary responsibility is the safe and expeditious recovery of nonvertical, short take-off and landing aircraft aboard U.S. aircraft carriers. OPNAV M-3750.6 says summarized statements from the controlling LSO after a mishap should include, if appropriate, the applicable items requested by section VII of the LSO NATOPS Manual.

What is flight deck certification on an aircraft carrier?

A U.S. Pacific Fleet story on USS Carl Vinson, dated September 17, 2020, says flight deck certification is required for the carrier to embark aircraft and evaluates the ship's ability to launch and recover aircraft safely in both day and night operations. A Navy story on USS Nimitz says the Air Department was required to catch 50 aircraft on the first day of flight operations, 70 the following day, and 40 by the end of the second night, and recorded 399 catches by the fifth day.

How is the CV NATOPS manual changed?

The same way as every NATOPS product. CNAF M-3710.7 paragraph 2.3.4 defines an interim change, issued by rapid means for an urgent or priority recommendation, a change limited to revised pages, and a revision that is a complete new edition shown only by a new date on the title page. Routine recommendations wait for the next NATOPS Review, which the manual says is typically held every 2 to 3 years, so the current edition date must be read from the title page or the NATOPS Status Report.

Sources

1. 1CNAF M-3710.7, NATOPS General Flight and Operating Instructions Manual (February 7, 2025) · Commander, Naval Air Forces, hosted by Navy Medicine (Naval Aerospace Medical Institute)
2. 2OPNAV M-3750.6, Naval Aviation Safety Program (October 24, 2024) · Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, hosted by Naval Safety Command
3. 3OPNAVINST 3710.7U, NATOPS General Flight and Operating Instructions (November 23, 2009) · Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, hosted by Headquarters Marine Corps Aviation
4. 4Hand Signals Chart 3: Flight Deck Handling Signals · Naval Safety Command
5. 5Carl Vinson, Navy's first operational F-35C squadron conduct flight deck certification · U.S. Pacific Fleet
6. 6USS Carl Vinson, U.S. Navy's First Operational F-35C Squadron, Conduct Flight Deck Certification · USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70), via DVIDS
7. 7Nimitz Completes Flight Deck Certification · U.S. Navy
8. 8Abraham Lincoln Earns Flight Deck Certification · U.S. Navy
9. 9New outlook for Landing Signal Officer trainers · Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR), March 14, 2013
10. 10French LSO Instructor Expresses Benefits of U.S. - France Alliance · Commander, Naval Air Force Atlantic, via DVIDS
11. 11Hanging up RJ's Paddles · USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) Public Affairs, U.S. Navy

Where this shows up in our work

• ELLMENT, the offline LLM for E-2D crews answers a crew's question from the aircraft's own manuals and cites the page, with no network.
• TRACE, the offline S1000D and IETM viewer opens S1000D, MIL-STD-3001 and PDF technical manuals on a tablet with every marking intact.