I have had similar issues. If the carrier joins the battle it is like the aircrafts never existied. The carrier work as normal unit in the battle while the aircrafts disappears for the battle and only reappears once the battle is over. Not sure if the same happens with battles involving aerodromes as I have not yet had such battles.

Anyway it seems a bit strange that your aircrafts would not be able to do anything for possibly many turns and that can potentially be a huge disadvantage as you are fighting a battle without several of your aircrafts while the enemy, if they maneuvered a bit better so their carriers are not in the battle may still be able to use their own aircrafts.

This sounds like a serious flaw, it could go to the Bug Reports section along with a save file, to help the Devs.

I can confirm they sometimes are not listed, other times appear but "already performed an action this turn". Maybe the movement of the carrier also "moves" the planes and (even though they still have their turn) this somehow halts them from fighting?

The same problem occurs if a hangar is within the perimeter of a ground combat. The planes happily patrol above the battlefield but don't appear as support (even those that are not on patrol mode).

This is happening in my games too, 2 years later. How I am supposed to use my planes in battle?

Yeah, I experienced it too. It's quite frustrating when it happens. 

For aerial units to engage in combat they need to be positioned out of the combat zone. If things stay that way then it should at least be possible to move the "locked" air forces to the "unlocked" airdrome, imo.

This is terribly annoying. Hope they would just show as a +sign that you can deploy.

FreeThinker wrote:

I guess the reason they currently disallow deployment of airplanes is because it creates problems when a carrier with airplanes is destroyed durring battle. The planes would have to relocated to another airstrip/carrier or be destroyed.

I think this too, but in that case, what problems could arise? Balance or on the engine? Because if the problem is "you lose all your planes when the carrier dies", then thats not much of a problem for me; but if it is something along the lines of "the game bugs out when a unit transporting other units is destroyed" that would be more understandable (but I would still ask for a fix if possible)