Sailors “manning the rails”

Jets aboard the USS Nimitz

Major Justin Knox

The USS Nimitz, 24 stories high and three football fields long, carries 85 military aircraft and more than 5,000 Navy personnel, with an average age of 19. Carrier, a new nine-part documentary premiering Sunday, April 27 at 9/8 p.m. CT on KET1 and KET HD, follows a core group of film participants, from the elite fighter pilots to the youngest sailors and everyone in between. They navigate personal conflicts around their jobs, families, faith, patriotism, love, the rites of passage and the war on terror.

Given unprecedented access by the Navy to the ship and its personnel, the filmmakers shot nearly 2,000 hours of high-definition video from May to November 2005 during a full six-month deployment to the Persian Gulf.

For the first time, Carrier presents a raw and personal look at the Navy’s role in this controversial war. “Carrier is a character-driven, edge-of-your-seat, nonfiction drama and a once-in-a-lifetime total immersion into the high stakes world of a nuclear aircraft carrier,” says executive producer and director Maro Chermayeff.

Another of the producers who lived and worked with crew members was Kentucky native Jeffrey Dupre. “We were with the crew for six months,” said Dupre, who now lives in New York. “We were one of them, part of the crew, and over that time you develop trust. I think that comes through in the film. It feels real and authentic, because it is.”

Carrier is a production of Icon Productions and Carrier Project Inc.