Maelstrom-class carrier

The Maelstrom-class assault carriers began entering United Nations Space Command (UNSC) service in 2402 to drastically increase the number of assault carriers available to the fleet. Prior to the commissioning of the UNSC Maelstrom, the UNSC had only six Gift of Wings assault carriers available to respond to the ongoing Inner Colony Wars. The Maelstrom assault carriers were instrumental in bringing the colonial crisis to an end by 2411. 
Following the introduction of the new Windstorm assault carriers, the Maelstrom-class began to be withdrawn from service and most were decommissioned and in reserve by the 2460s; the last of the class were out of service by 2472. Alongside the still active Windstorm-class, all extant Maelstrom carriers were reclassified as light carriers in 2475. 
The majority of the Maelstrom carriers languished in reserve during the Insurrection and seemed likely to remain there until the Covenant invasion in 2525. 
==History==
===Development and construction===
*Desperate Need: The Inner Colony Wars
*After being delayed by politicking for most of the 2390s, UEG approves construction in late 2398
===Service===
*Maelstrom answers the 'Tempest Challenge': quelling the colonial crisis in under 10 years
*"What we needed then is not what we need now": potential replacements
*Windstorm and the slow retirement (2450 - 2472)
*The "perceived ignominy of reclassification"
*Return to action: the Human-Covenant War
==Design==
*Speed for construction, speed for deployment, speed for assault actions
*Light armor even by contemporary standards
*Underwhelming main gun (and some that didn't even get that)
==Ships in class==
*UNSC Maelstrom (2402)
Category:Carrier classes