It's Battlestar China! Media passes off sci-fi pictures as aircraft carrier of the future

Japanese-language version of a state media site used images from Battlestar Galactica

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The website said these were images of a futuristic aircraft carrier. They are actually spaceship designs used in the US television programme Battlestar Galactica. Photo: Screenshot via China.org.cn

Published: 12:00pm, 27 Aug 2013Updated: 8:55am, 28 Aug 2013

When a Chinese news portal ran a piece about aircraft carriers of the future, its editors wanted to illustrate it with a selection of hi-tech images.

But they may have stepped slightly too far into the future, as the accompanying pictures that appeared on the site showed designs for spaceships featured in the US smash sci-fi show Battlestar Galactica.

The article, entitled '4 Major Trends In Aircraft Carrier Development', was published on the Japanese language version of the China Internet Information Centre, a web portal authorised by the Chinese government which features official news translated into a variety of languages, including Japanese, Korean and English.

This image appears on the website galacticafanon.wikia.com/

The article focuses on developments in missile defence systems, stealth fighters, automated drones and electromagnetic catapults, all of which will play an important role in the construction of future aircraft carriers.

Japanese netizens were not as intrigued with the piece’s content as they were with the images accompanying it. Many commented that the article’s two pictures, labelled as concepts for “future aircraft carrier designs,” looked like something from science fiction.

“Are these graphics from a video game?” one netizen wrote, while others said that the pictures looked reminiscent of Macross, a Japanese animation which debuted in 1982 and featured futuristic robots and spaceships.

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